


Hard-Knock Life

by kitlaurie



Series: Klaus Orphan au [1]
Category: Klaus (2019)
Genre: Adoption, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Kid Fic, M/M, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-03
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:07:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 73,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22103080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kitlaurie/pseuds/kitlaurie
Summary: In the absence of a working postal service the Smeerensburg post office has been (unofficially) repurposed as an (unsupervised) orphanage.And now that's Jesper's problem.
Relationships: Alva & Jesper Johanssen, Jesper Johanssen & Mogens, Jesper Johanssen/Klaus
Series: Klaus Orphan au [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1590952
Comments: 371
Kudos: 620





	1. Eviction Notice

Really, Jesper shouldn't have been expecting much from the post office after what he'd seen of Smeerensburg thus far, but he'd never been the type to go into things with low expectations.

The outside was not promising, to say the least. It was small, shabby, looked like it would fall over in a stiff breeze, the old iron wrought sign had the audacity to drop the "s" from "post" right as they arrived, and crudely painted just to the right of the door in uneven black letters were the words "Orphan Asylum".

Jesper's brow creased. "Hey uh, what's that all about?" He asked, pointing at the sloppily painted words with both hands.

The ferryman didn't even spare him a glance. 

"Oh that? I wouldn't worry yourself too much about that. Y'know, if there's one thing people here in Smeerensburg are good at, well aside from the obvious, it's thriftiness. Don't let anything go to waste. Nice little out of the way building like this, they'll definitely find a good use for it."

Jesper was just about to ask what he meant by that when the door swung open and he was left speechless by the sight of at least half a dozen grubby, ragamuffin children staring back at them in shock.

"Happy Father's Day!" Mogens called out behind him. "The kids come with the office."

-

At some point the ferryman had simply slipped out. Maybe there just wasn't much fun to be had antagonizing him in his stunned stupor.

That left Jesper standing in the middle of what was supposed to be his base of operations.The post office was quite a sight. A one room office with chickens nesting in the post boxes and walls that were more drafts than wood.

And of course, the kids.

"I don't know what you kids think you're doing here, but this is no place to play. Run along home now."

One little girl had moved herself to the front center of the group and was giving him a hard stare. She had dark circles under her eyes and a severe, stern look to her face.

"We aren't going anywhere. You're the one who needs to leave!" She told him firmly.

"You tell him, Nelly!" A younger girl with a chicken sitting calmly in her lap yelled.

"Ok, Nelly is it? Listen-"

"Joelle let me handle this!" The grim-faced girl, Nelly, said through gritted teeth.

"And this is Joelle. Good. Actually, that's enough. I don't need to know everybody's name." Jesper said, waving his hand dismissively. "What are you doing here?"

"We live here!" Joelle answered.

"I'm sorry, there must be some mistake. You can't live here, this is a post office."

Nelly crossed her arms. "Well nobody was using it."

"You can't take over a building just because it's empty! This office is property of the Royal Postal Service!" He smacked the support beam nearest him for emphasis. It groaned, twisted sideways, and sent a not insignificant chunk of the ceiling crashing to the floor barely missing him and the girls.

"I don't think they want it anymore." Said Joelle, after a few moments of staring silently at the debris.

"Yeah," added another girl, her short hair stuck out every which way and her pants were clearly too short for her lanky frame. "And if they sent you here they probly don't want you anymore either."

"Exactly." Nelly agreed.

"Ok, listen." He could feel what little grasp he had on this situation slipping. How was this day real? "You can't just say that to a person!"

"And you can't just kick people out of their home!" Nelly retorted.

"This isn't your home!" He shot back, barely managing not to yell. "Where are your parents?"

Their little spokeswoman fixed him with the coldest stare he'd ever seen, which was saying something after the day he'd had.

"If we had parents we wouldn't be here."

Jesper instantly realized his mistake. Hadn't he just asked about the slapdash sign outside?

"But aren't there any other adults who can take you in? What about the teacher? You know, up at the school?"

"The fishmonger lady?" Asked one of the boys. "She has her own problems."

Jesper couldn't argue with him there.

-

After a long circular argument about property laws and squatters rights with literal children started to seem a bit pointless, Jesper managed to get the kids to agree to an uneasy truce for the night.

He did his best to try and settle in around his hostile new roommates. Upstairs he could tell there had been attempts made to patch the holes and cracks in the roof with scrap wood in some places but more often with old bits of blanket and cloth tarp that billowed in the wind like sails. Plenty of snow still managed to get in through the cracks and the room was really no warmer than outside.

After being told that he was by no means allowed to make use of the one and only bed he took a thin blanket, crossed his fingers that these kids didn't come up with a more gruesome tactic for getting rid of him, and tried to make himself comfortable sitting at the desk downstairs with his head in his arms.

He wasn't exactly sure why he couldn't have the bed, it didn't seem like they were using it. All through the night he could hear thumps and bumps and loud whispering from upstairs. Every time he closed his eyes all he could see was that little girl from town with the carrot. It left him with a vague sense of dread.

He must have fallen asleep at some point though because he woke up the next morning to little fingers in his face, pushing one eyelid open.

"Is he dead?" Asked the short haired girl.

"Get off of me!" He yelled, jumping up. "I'm not dead! What's wrong with you!?"

"Aw man," said a red haired boy sitting on the desk. "I was really hoping he was dead."

"Well what were we gonna do then, Oskar?" The girl asked. "Who's gonna carry him outta here? You wanna touch a dead body?"

The boy, Oskar, just shrugged.

"Yvette!" Nelly yelled from across the room. "I thought we agreed we weren't going to talk to him anymore!"

"We're not talkin' to him, we're just touchin' him!" Yvette yelled back.

Jesper decided he didn't want to be talked to or touched anymore and left the children to sort things out for themselves. If they were going to ignore him than it only seemed fair that he would return the favor.

That idea quickly proved pointless, however, as the kids seemed completely incapable of leaving him be. Every time he so much as looked at something in the post office one of them was yelling "That's not yours!" or "Don't touch that!"

He opened the door to what he assumed was a pantry and found yet another little girl huddled inside. The girl yelped when she saw him and pulled the door right out of his hand, slamming it hard.

"Agnes get out of there!" Nelly called, again from the other side of the post office. She seemed to be moving around the room so that she was always as far away from him as possible without actually leaving. Just watching him like a hawk.

The door opened a crack, just enough for little Agnes to slip through and dart past him straight to Nelly where she tried her best to hide behind the only slightly bigger girl.

Joelle made her way out of the woodwork and seemed to have an endless supply of questions for him on anything and everything.

"Why do you wear so much blue? Is it your favorite color?"

"Did you get sick when you were on Mr. Mogens boat?"

"Do you like cats or dogs better? Cats are my favorite but I like dogs too. I wanna have my own cat but they always run away when I bring them home."

Eventually he gave up on the idea of actually getting ready for the day and headed into town tired and hungry.

-

After the catastrophic failure that was his first official day as a Postman Jesper was almost relieved to return to the post office. Almost.

He also almost missed the new problem waiting for him when he got back, would have walked right past it if the sound of crumpling paper underfoot hadn't interrupted the steady crunch of the snow.

He looked down and was surprised to see his father's unmistakable tidy handwriting on the sheet of paper under his shoe. On closer examination it appeared to be basic instructions for managing a small town post office. Finances, scheduling tips, etc. He wasn't sure if he should be touched that his Dad had done something helpful or insulted that he didn't think his son could work these things out for himself.

Looking up from the note he noticed other strange shapes strewn around the front of the post office and quickly realized it was the rest of the things he'd brought with him. Everything he had to his name in Smeerensburg that wasn't on his person.

He looked up further and saw little faces quickly disappear from the second story window.

"Strange weather we've been having recently, huh?"

Jesper turned to see the ferryman loitering not ten feet from the steps of the post office, looking for all the world like his only purpose in life was to witness his suffering.

"Did you watch them do this?" Jesper asked. "What are you even doing here?"

"Just checking in." Mogens said, absently scratching his stubble. "Wanted to make sure working as both a Postman and a matron wasn't too much for you. Wouldn't do to leave port without a potential passenger."

One day. It had been one day and already he'd had enough of this man. Maybe his feelings were a little exaggerated by exactly what kind of day that one day had been, but Jesper was not in the mood to add insult to injury to insult to injury to insult.

"Well feel free to leave whenever you'd like! I don't plan on going anywhere any time soon!"

With that he turned his back on Mogens and began rounding up his cold, soggy belongings.

He really wished he'd actually payed attention to what had been packed for him before he was unceremoniously sent off to Smeerensburg. Rifling through the snow he had no idea what he was even looking for or how he would know if he'd found it all.

Eventually his fingers had gone numb and there was nothing he could still see left out in the snow. He gave up his search and elbowed his way through the front door, arms mostly full of papers and what looked to be a single set of spare clothes.

Inside, the kids were all there waiting for him. At least, he assumed it was all of them. He hadn't exactly bothered to do a head count.

Just like yesterday Nelly was front and center with her arms crossed.

"We'll do it again!" She said loudly, before he even opened his mouth.

He looked around at all the tense, apprehensive little faces doing their best to look angry and intimidating.

"If you want me gone so badly why didn't you lock me out?" He asked, genuinely confused.

She looked away and hesitated before answering.

"The door doesn't lock." She begrudgingly admitted.

"Good to know." He said, dropping his meager possessions on the desk. "Then I guess you're stuck with me."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise this is a Jesper/Klaus story, but there will be probably a few chapters of just Jesper and the kids dealing with each other and Smeerensburg before meeting Klaus.
> 
> "Orphan Asylum" is a reference to the Rankin Bass film Santa Claus is Comin' to Town. It seemed fitting, Klaus really feels like a sort of spiritual sequel/successor to that movie.
> 
> Mogens' "Father's Day" line comes from a comment Tumblr user lokomotives made on my original post for this idea. And then lisondraws (also on Tumblr) used it as well so now it feels sort of ingrained in this story. I couldn't not use it!
> 
> You can find more stuff about this idea on Tumblr (username is still kitlaurie there) and in the Klaus Orphan au tag you can also find some great art that lisondraws has done based on my original posts!


	2. By All Means

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There may be a feud in Smeerensburg but there is a war going on in this Post Office.

As the days passed the children's efforts to scare him off got more aggressive.

His things would still wander off on occasion. He'd found his hat on the roof and his bag under the porch and his coat stuffed in the old pot belly stove. Though so far nothing had disappeared for good, as far as he could tell.

He'd also found slugs in his shoes on more than one occasion. Also in his hat, coat pockets, and stuffed in the bottom of his bag. Anything left unattended long enough seemed to find itself with a sudden infestation. He didn't know how these kids were finding so many slugs in the constant cold but the poor creatures were some of their favorite props to torment him with.

They also seemed to have committed to giving him the silent treatment, or at least most of them had. When they remembered to.

Yvette never passed up a chance to verbally antagonize him.

"Hey Jeepers! Got anything for me in your mailbag? I'm missin' a lot of birthday cards!"

And no matter what the others were doing Joelle always had something to say to him.

He would frequently feel her pulling at his sleeve or find her right in his face eager to tell him about her day, or what she'd heard people in town talking about, or the cute dog she saw.

And she sure did love to talk about animals for someone who, as far as he'd seen, wasn't very well liked by them. The chickens were fond enough of her, but any other critter she tried to interact with seemed like they would rather run off a cliff than let her touch them.

He'd come back one evening to a huge commotion coming from inside the post office. When he'd opened the door about half a dozen frightened chickens had run out followed by a large, shabby, angry tabby cat.

Joelle had rushed to the door behind them.

" _No!_ " She'd cried. "You let him out!"

The chickens had all come back, eventually. The tabby cat did not.

-

Slugs and verbal jabs and endless chattering were far from the worst of it though.

There was also _Lucy_.

_Lucy_ was an old oversized baby doll. The kindest way to describe it's condition would probably have been well-loved. Her tattered dress was the same dirt-stained color as her fabric body and her left eye hung loose and lazy in it's socket. All the paint had worn off of her so from a distance those mismatched eyes were the only discernible features on her little face.

Jesper had no idea where this thing had come from. He'd woken up one morning to see the doll sitting in a chair across from him at the desk. And yes that had been startling, had gotten a pretty dramatic gasp out of him. But he'd quickly just become annoyed that they'd managed to get a cheap rise out of him with it.

"What is _that_!?" He'd demanded.

"Jasper, don't be rude!" Yvette had scolded him in a mocking tone. "It's just Lucy."

"Where did it come from!?"

"What do you mean?" Oskar had chimed in. "She's been here the whole time."

And it went on like that. All of the children insisting that the doll had always been there and talking about it as if it were a real person. It was one of the few things they broke their intermittent silence for.

They would move the thing around while he was gone or while he slept. He'd found it sitting right inside of the door, waiting for him to open it. Seen it sitting in the corner facing the wall in time-out, and woken up to find it mere inches from his face.

At first it was, at worst, mildly upsetting. But as the days went on and the kids kept talking about the doll and _to_ the doll and moving it around it became considerably more unsettling. It got to the point where he could barely stand to be in the same room as the thing. Which was pretty bad, considering there was only the one room.

-

Jesper's first few days in Smeerensburg were proving to be a challenge all around, to say the least.

He'd very briefly considered reading through his father's instructions to see if there was actually anything relevant to Smeerensburg's _unique_ situation in there but quickly decided that no, he was still mad at him and he'd figure out how to get through this without his help, thank you very much.

He just hadn't quite nailed down the best approach yet and the sleepless nights hunched over the desk, wondering what he'd wake up to next, weren't exactly helping.

He stared blankly at the map of Smeerensburg, already littered with dozens of tiny red X's, hoping that maybe some brilliant new tactic might occur to him out of thin air.

Maybe it was the exhaustion or all the pointless rounds or the constant pestering but he was beginning to feel very overwhelmed.

"Mister, are you crying?" Asked a quiet voice at his elbow.

Jesper gave the red-headed boy a long stare through watery eyes.

"You're not Oskar." He said distantly.

"No, I'm not." The Not-Oskar replied evenly.

"You got your own name, by any chance?" Jesper asked after a long silence.

"Oliver." 

"Ok, Oliver, maybe I _was_ crying but I think that's a perfectly normal response for someone in my situation. And also, it's none of your business."

"Maybe you'd have better emotional stability if you went somewhere where you could get a good night's sleep." Said Nelly from across the room, not bothering to look at him as she helped Agnes tie the laces on her boots.

"I'm not accepting criticism on my sleep habits from someone who could beat a raccoon in a raccoon impersonation contest." He told her, testily.

"Maybe _I_ would sleep better if there wasn't a strange man in my house." She shot back.

"This isn't your house." He said under his breath. "This isn't anybody's house. It's not even a good chicken coop."

But as far as Nelly was concerned the conversation was over. She and Agnes were already leaving to go do whatever it was these kids did when they weren't tormenting him.

-

There didn't seem to be any point in rushing out to town first thing in the morning to collect the likely non-existent post and the lack of any tangible progress was making him restless.

With the most piercing set of eyes off of him for once he got to work trying to give the front of the post office some sense of order.

He started by clearing out the post boxes, or at least he tried to. Every time one box was finished there would be a chicken in it again before he'd even started the next one. Eventually he left them to their appropriated nesting boxes and moved onto the cabinets. The cabinets which had doors. Doors that chickens couldn't open.

He opened a small one, close to the floor, and found an assortment of rocks, dead leaves, buttons, and other such odds and ends.

"That's Sophie's stuff." Oliver told him. "If you touch it she'll scream."

"Oh, really?" Jesper said, unimpressed.

He had a hard time believing that. Sophie was the only one of the kids who hadn't been either actively terrorizing him or avoiding him like he was some kind of fairytale monster come to gobble them up in the night. All she ever did was keep to herself, playing quietly. Sometimes she might show one of the other kids a rock or leaf or whatever else she thought was interesting, but for the most part he just tried not to step on her. If the other kids didn't occasionally talk to her he wouldn't even know her name.

Safe to say, he was willing to take his chances with her on this one.

It didn't even seem like she'd noticed what he was doing. She hadn't payed him any mind at all that morning, as per usual.

He reached into the cabinet.

In an instant, almost as if he had called her name, Sophie was at his side. Her face was blank but her eyes were wide as she stared at him with rapt attention.

He looked between her and the cabinet, and then pulled a single dead leaf from the pile.

And she screamed. One long, piercing sound that never rose or dropped in pitch or volume. Screamed louder than should be possible for anything so little.

He quickly dropped the leaf and threw his empty hands up in surrender.

The screaming stopped almost immediately and once Sophie seemed satisfied that everything was as she left it Jesper moved on to another, higher cabinet. One he hoped was too far up to be as appealing a hiding spot.

"What's this?" He asked, pulling a handful of papers out.

"Mine!" Yvette yelled, jumping down from her perch on the wood pile. "So give it here!"

Jesper examined the rough scribbling. Even though the scenes were depicted solely in smeary grey he could still easily make out their, uh, gruesome subject matter.

"Is this the ferryman?"

"Maybe." She said defensively, making a grab for the papers.

"Can I ask why you made so many... _Interesting_ drawings of him?" He asked, holding them far over her head.

"It's my emergency plan! In case we ever have to kill him." She yelled, jumping in a futile attempt to snatch her drawings.

"What!? Why would you ever need to kill him?" 

"I don't know, but have you seen that guy!?"

No matter what Jesper's personal opinion of Mogens might be, he felt like this was probably overkill.

"I'm confiscating these." He said, tucking them into a pocket.

"Well you better not come crying to me if he pulls somethin' and you don't have a plan!" She made a big show of stomping her foot but left it at that.

"Well, hopefully I won't be needing one!"

"Hopefully." She repeated grimly.

"Ok that's enough of that. I'm heading into town. Don't plot anymore murders while I'm gone and try not to make anything else sticky." He said, doorknob in hand. "I don't know how you're doing it and it's freaking me out."

-

His walk to town wasn't exactly nice, but at least it was quiet. At first.

"Hey! Mr. Postman! Jesper!"

Joelle had followed him.

This wasn't the first time she had done this. It had become almost routine to have her trailing behind him, yammering on endlessly about everything she saw or heard along the way.

This had to be the most consistent of all the things these kids did to get on his nerves. She interrupted his attempts to talk to people, yelled loudly whenever she saw an animal, and never ever seemed to get tired.

It was somewhere around the fifth time she'd interrupted one of his one-sided conversations about the benefits of the postal service that he snapped.

He stopped, turning on his heel to look at her.

"Ok, listen. I put up with enough of this nonsense back at the post office. I shouldn't have to deal with you out here too."

He instantly knew he'd made a mistake, gotten something about the situation wrong. She stood there in stunned silence, lip shaking, tears beginning to roll down her cheeks.

Suddenly she turned and bolted down the street, crying in big ugly sobs.

Great, just what he needed. Another reason for these kids to hate him.

He needed to find her quick, get her calmed down before one of the other kids saw and decided they could discover new levels of hell for him to live in.

Or maybe everything was fine. When he saw Joelle again she'd spotted a dog and was running over to see it, happy as she ever was.

Jesper was ready to go, to leave her be and not mess things up any further than he already had, when he saw the Krum boy standing with the dog. 

Saw the boy see Joelle reaching her hand out to pet the animal, and saw him turn and shove her _hard_ into the muddy street.

There were tears streaming down her face again and before he even knew he was moving Jesper found himself standing between the two children. 

"Excuse me, ma'am. Is this your son?" He asked, addressing the closest adult he could find.

The woman barely glanced at them over her shoulder.

"Yes."

"Well I think you should know he just pushed this little girl to the ground for no reason."

The woman turned and crossed her arms.

"Oh, I'm sure he had a good reason." She said, looking between him and Joelle. " _Those_ children are always up to something."

Jesper was appalled and spluttered uselessly for a moment as the boy smirked at him from behind his mother's skirts.

He scooped Joelle up off the ground and stormed away. That was it, day over, no more asking for letters, no more Krums, no more Ellingboes, he was done.

Once they were clear of the crowds Jesper set her down and did his best to check for injuries. It looked like she'd caught herself on her elbow when she fell. Both her coat and shirt sleeve were torn but her elbow was only scraped.

What were you supposed to do for scrapes? Clean them, right? He didn't have anything sanitary enough to clean a wound with. Hopefully it'd be alright.

"Why did you help me?" She asked in the tiniest voice he'd ever heard from her.

"Well, I wasn't about to leave you crying in the street."

"But you hate me! You yelled at me!" She sobbed.

"Ok, I only got upset because I thought you were _trying_ to make me mad." That was, at the very least, a half-truth. "I thought you wanted me to get so mad at you that I would leave. Isn't that, like, your whole thing?"

"You thought I was talking to you all the time because I didn't like you?" She asked between sniffles.

"Well when you put it like that-" he started.

"So you don't hate me, right? You like having me around?"

Oh boy.

"Sure, no. Of course I don't hate you."

Joelle jumped up excitedly and gave him a quick strong hug before resuming her usual chatter as they made their way back to the post office together.

-

Sometime after Joelle had gone upstairs with Nelly and her little rusty sewing kit to get her sleeve patched he saw Agnes carefully open the front door and peek inside. As per usual she froze up almost instantly and Jesper prepared to leave the room so she could pass through in peace.

That was, until he noticed that her eyes weren't on him. In fact it seemed like she didn't even know he was in the room.

And if he was following her line of sight correctly it looked like they might have a common enemy.

"Hey," he said, kneeling down beside her.

Predictably she nearly jumped out of her skin, eyes impossibly wide.

"You don't like that thing either, do you?" He pressed on, pointing at where Lucy was propped up in the corner.

Agnes shook her head so hard he was surprised it didn't fly off her shoulders.

"Maybe if we work together we can figure out how to get rid of it."

She furrowed her little brow, clearly thinking very hard about his offer.

"Oh, I know!" She said excitedly and waved her hand at him.

After a few seconds of silence between them she became visibly annoyed. Even though it was him she was annoyed with he found it oddly nice to see her so expressive after days of nothing but petrified staring.

"This means come here." She said, gesturing at him again. "I'm trying to tell you a secret."

"Oh."

He leaned in awkwardly so she could whisper in his ear.

"Nelly doesn't like Lucy either. She's actually really really scared of her. That's why she thought it would make you wanna go away."

Huh.

"I think we can work with that."

-

"Are they asleep?"

Agnes nodded her head, a look of determination on her face.

"You ready?" Jesper asked.

"Ready!" She said in an excited whisper.

That excitement was short lived.

"I don't wanna touch it." Agnes said, pathetically.

"I don't wanna touch it either." Jesper replied, just as pathetically.

It had seemed like a good idea earlier that night but now they were both frozen, just looking at the oversized baby doll staring back at them from the dark with it's one good eye.

"Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if we did it together." He offered tentatively.

"Oh, yeah!" That seemed to break Agnes out of it and she rushed over to the doll immediately.

It was awkward having two people carry something so small and light only a few feet across the room but it did make them both feel better.

Jesper climbed only part of the way up the stairs with her, just enough to see indistinct shapes huddled around the room. It was an unspoken boundary that the upstairs was a place the children could go to get away from him, and he'd respected it ever since that first day. It felt wrong to cross that line now.

"You got it from here?"

Agnes nodded her head and pulled Lucy out of his hands and the rest of the way up the stairs.

As he turned away he heard her quietly call down,

"Goodnight, Mr. Postman."

"Oh, uh, goodnight." He said awkwardly, caught off guard as she disappeared from sight.

-

Sometime before dawn the next morning, in between one brief moment of successful rest and another, Jesper heard a short frightened cry from somewhere above him.

" _Really?_ " Echoed Yvette's sleepy voice afterwards. " _Really, Nelly?_ "

Jesper smirked into his folded arms, but something didn't sit right with him. His sense of victory sank like a rock in his gut and that heavy feeling made it hard for him to enjoy his successful retaliation.

-

He managed to get ready for his day in relative peace that morning. Not that it meant anything for how things would go once he left for town.

It was a surprisingly quiet day, as much as a day in Smeerensburg could be quiet. The kids had left him completely alone. No one followed him into town or hid his things or set up some nasty surprise for him.

As he made his way back to the post office that evening he noticed the children were all gathered outside circled around... Something.

There was a patch of upturned earth at the center of their circle, a loose plank of wood stuck into the ground next to it. Nelly stood behind it, all eyes on her as she spoke. As he got closer her speech became clearer and he noticed a name written on the-

Oh God, they were having a funeral for the doll.

"-may she rest in peace and not rise up to take revenge against those who have wronged her." Nelly finished solemnly, making full eye-contact with him across the yard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I restructured this chapter so many times. Some of these little scenes have been bouncing around in my head since I first came up with this idea. I wonder if you can tell which ones?
> 
> Nelly is 110% the kind of older sibling who only feels brave and tough when she has someone else relying on her. She's (not so) secretly a big anxious mess.


	3. Empty Belly Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey Jesper, how's that poverty treatin' ya?

Jesper was starting to think there was something... Wrong... With the way he was spending money.

He'd finally broken down and taken a look at his father's notes. There was a full breakdown of expected costs, both personal living costs and operating costs for the post office. As well as a guide to budgeting expenses, complete with an outline and all the necessary equations for calculating a full income statement. All things Jesper was relatively familiar with.

And it all seemed very reasonable.

If you weren't in Smeerensburg.

There were no operating costs, no net income after expenses, no budgeted postman's salary because there were no letters. No letters, no packages, no postal fees.

And the limited stipend he'd arrived with was running awfully tight already.

The main reason for that was most likely because every person in town had been price gouging him. Which he hadn't noticed. For weeks.

He'd probably been paying about three times the average market price for food and goods since he'd arrived and hadn't even realized. If he hadn't overheard a much more cordial transaction between two Krums he probably would have stayed ignorant about it for the rest of the year.

It had seemed a little odd that both clans had been so willing to do business with him, considering the way he was generally treated. But he'd just assumed that they didn't want to turn away a paying customer. Now he knew it had all been a big joke at his expense, just like everything else since he'd arrived in this icy nightmare.

Jesper was quickly learning that that's just how things were in Smeerensburg. The Krums against the Ellingboes, the Ellingboes against the Krums, both clans against those kids, and everyone against him.

-

Avoiding the townsfolk's ridiculous mark-ups didn't mean starvation, thankfully. There were some advantages to sharing a living space with chickens.

The kids had told him they couldn't actually eat the chickens because, apparently, just mentioning it would make Joelle cry.

And making sure Joelle didn't cry was priority number one. Well, maybe not number one, but it was pretty high on the list.

So the invasive fowl didn't provide any meat, but they were surprisingly reliable layers. Almost to the point that leaving the eggs untouched created a hazard.

It was basically first come, first serve. If you see an egg, you take it. Otherwise there was a very real risk of broody hens sitting on them until they rotted or of a stray egg disappearing behind the stove or under the desk and meeting a similar fate.

So there were plenty of eggs to go around. However, the post office was not the most convenient place to cook and Jesper was not the best at cooking.

"Is he crying again?" Oliver asked.

"He doesn't know how to boil water." Oskar whispered to his brother, loudly.

"I know how to boil water, thank you very much!" Jesper called back, louder.

The boys quietly shuffled away, but only just far enough that they _thought_ they were out of sight. Jesper could still see them out of the corner of his eye, peeking in on him and the simmering pot on top of the pot belly stove.

He did, in fact, know how to boil water. What he didn't know how to do was boil an egg.

During his first attempt he hadn't realized you could put the eggs in the water before it boiled until it was too late. His 'careful' attempt to drop them in the shallow pot without cooking his fingers resulted only in some very ugly egg soup.

His second attempt started with an egg safely at the bottom of the pot before it was set on the stove, but ended too soon. Which he only found out after he cracked the shell and found his hands covered in a mess of under-cooked egg white.

Finally, he left the the egg to boil for as long as he could stand to wait and didn't take it out until the water cooled on it's own. It was definitely cooked this time, if a little rubbery, and all seemed fine until he got to the yolk and the grey-green color of it gave him pause.

"You can still eat it like that." Said a quiet voice at his elbow.

Jesper looked down to see that Oliver had snuck up on him again.

"Yeah!" Added Oskar from his other side, making a much less subtle entrance. "It's overcooked, but it's not like it's gonna kill you!"

"Well I'd like to see you do better." Jesper said, bitterly assessing the results of his hard work.

"Ok."

"What was that?"

"I said 'ok'." Oliver repeated, not bothered in the slightest. "So gimme the pot."

Jesper handed him the, now cool, dented metal pot.

Both boys quickly got to work starting a fresh pot of water and eggs.

"You should start with the eggs in cold water." Oliver explained as they all waited for the pot to come to a boil again. "But take it off the stove as soon as it starts bubbling."

When the water finally reached a rolling boil Oliver reached up without a word and carefully moved the pot off the stove with a bit of old raggedy sheet wrapped around both hands, leaving the fire going to warm the room.

Jesper felt an immediate twinge of guilt for letting the boy handle the boiling pot on his own when he had to reach over his head to lift it, but he had it safely set to the side before he could step in.

Meanwhile, Oskar had run outside and collected a bucketful of snow.

"We'll put them in here when they're done so they stop cooking." He explained, holding the bucket up for Jesper to see.

"And how do we know when they're done?" Jesper asked.

The boys looked at each other and shrugged.

"You kinda get a feel for it, I guess." Oskar said, vaguely.

While they waited for whatever perfect moment the eggs would be ready the boys entertained themselves by playing a word game where you said what you were packing for a trip but every item had to start with the same letter.

They both preferred naming things that started with O, so there were lots of oars and owls and oranges and oatmeal and one octopus which inexplicably sent them both into a fit of giggles.

After a few minutes Oliver announced that the eggs should be done and all three of them carefully moved them from the warm water to the bucket of snow.

Once they were cool enough to touch Oskar pulled one out, peeled the shell, and tore the hard-boiled egg in half exposing the bright orangey-yellow yolk.

"Ta-da!" He exclaimed, holding it up for Jesper to see.

"See, it's easy." Oliver said as he peeled his own egg.

If he had to resort to living off of nothing but eggs, Jesper thought to himself, at least they would be well made eggs.

-

There was one other avenue for acquiring food that he'd been avoiding. Although, admittedly, she had a better reason to overcharge him than most people in town.

As he walked back into the school Jesper allowed himself a moment to let the absolute absurdity of this town wash over him. The post office was full of children and the school was full of fish. It made him feel hysterical and a little light headed, although that could've just been the sleep deprivation. Maybe he'd have better luck finding letters if he went out to the pier and fished for them.

As he approached the desk Alva distractedly started in on an automatic greeting and sales pitch, which was cut short as soon as she laid eyes on him.

"Ugh, it's you."

"If you're trying to insult me you'll have to work a little harder than that." Jesper said. "That's how everybody greets me these days."

"Are you going to buy something this time?" She asked, picking her knife back up.

He watched her work for a moment. He knew what he’d come in here for. Make a, hopefully reasonable, purchase and get out. But the words were coming out of his mouth before he'd even fully thought them.

"Did you know there's a bunch of kids in the post office?"

Alva paused, knife mid-air, and looked at him with equal parts annoyance and confusion.

" _What_ are you talking about?"

"The post office." He said, gesturing vaguely towards the door. "There's a bunch of orphan kids living in it. Do you not get out much?"

"Listen, postman, this isn't funny." She said, slamming the knife into the desk.

"No, trust me I know." He said, rubbing at his tired face. "It _definitely_ isn't funny."

Suddenly her eyes were darting back and forth, looking anywhere but at him. She looked distracted, distressed.

She really didn't know.

"If this is all you came in here for I think you should leave. Now." She said firmly, still not meeting his eyes.

"Actually, I was hoping to buy some fish today. If you can spare any." He told her, gesturing around the crowded schoolhouse.

She made a noise of exasperation “Is there some reason why you can’t do that somewhere else?”

He wasn’t sure what could have upset her so badly that she suddenly wanted him gone more than she wanted his money.

“Well if you must know,” He said, still willing to keep poking this particular hornets nest. “I haven't exactly had the best luck getting things I need around here without paying an arm and a leg."

Alva responded with a short, harsh laugh.

"Yeah, good luck with that. Took me ages to get anyone to haggle with me on equal footing." She said. "And you're not nearly useful enough for people around here to start respecting you anytime soon."

"Gee, thanks."

"Alright, fine. If you're actually buying something what do you want?" She seemed to have, at least temporarily, broken out of whatever weird mood his earlier statements had put her in.

Jesper shrugged. "Uh, something cheap?"

"Yeah, I think I can see where your problems with finding fair prices might have started." She said.

That weird nervous energy seemed to slowly overtake her again as she wordlessly picked something for him, prepared it, and wrapped it in thick brown paper.

She told him a price and he paid it.

"God, you are way too trusting." She muttered as Jesper handed her the money.

They parted awkwardly. Alva once again avoiding his eye and shifting nervously. Jesper not sure if he should thank her or not. 

But this had definitely been cheaper than what he'd been buying before now, by a lot, and the soggy brown paper package was heavy in his hands as he left.

-

Jesper had never cooked fish before, and looking at the carefully cut raw flesh with that task in mind did wane his appetite slightly. But how hard could it be? All you had to do was not burn it, right? It might not be five-star cuisine, but it should at least be edible.

As the fish started to sizzle in the dry iron pan he’d deemed serviceable for the task he felt the, now very familiar, sensation of little eyes on him.

It was well into the evening, so it wasn’t unusual for all of the children to be hanging around somewhere in the post office, bored and restless and looking for something to do.

Jesper did his best to ignore them and focus on his cooking. The pieces of fish were releasing an awful lot of grease. And was it normal for it to be shrinking?

Everytime he took his eyes off the food it seemed like they got closer and their staring less subtle. Even the ones who usually at least tried to pretend they were minding their own business (Sophie, Nelly) were watching him with obvious interest, and the ones who were never shy about hovering around him (Joelle, Oskar) would probably burn themselves on the stove if they got any closer.

He took a deep, exasperated breath. If he didn’t say anything this was going to go on all night.

“Do you want some?” He asked to no one in particular, looking up at a random corner and away from the gawking children.

“No!” Nelly said immediately. “We don’t need _you_ to give us food!”

He shifted his gaze away from the ceiling and saw her expression shift from offense and rage to conflicted and thoughtful as she watched the fish sizzle and pop on the stove.

“But maybe we could make a trade?” She offered cautiously.

“What have you got?” He wasn’t sure how he felt taking something from these kids. Partly because they tended to not have his best interest in mind and partly because he doubted they had much to give up in the first place.

Nelly called Yvette over to help her and together the two girls pulled over a small crate that had been tucked away in one corner. They pulled the sheet off the top revealing a huge hidden stash of bread.

There were rolls and loaves of all shapes and sizes. Some whole, some sliced, some torn, and some that weren’t quite the right color anymore.

Nelly pressed a full, round roll into Jesper’s hand.

“Where did you get all this?” He asked. “Did you steal it?”

“No!” Nelly said, defensively.

“We got it from the trash!” Joelle told him with great enthusiasm.

“Joelle, _please_.” Nelly pleaded.

“It’s the stuff the bakers don’t think they can sell ‘cause it got old and gross.” Oliver clarified.

“Yeah!” Oskar chimed in. “We check behind the bakeries almost every day! We find a lot of stuff!”

"Can you believe it? They throw all this away just because it starts getting a little hard." Nelly said with judgment in her voice and a sneer on her face. "Not everyone can afford to be so picky about their bread."

Jesper looked down at the stale roll he'd been handed and realized that was him now. He was someone who couldn't afford to be picky about his bread.

He watched all the chickens come running as Joelle took one of the greener loaves and started breaking it into pieces for them. No wonder they liked her so much. He tried not to think too hard about what that moldy bread might mean for their little food chain here in the post office.

“So, fair trade?” Nelly asked. Her arms were crossed and her posture was carefully schooled, but the effect didn’t quite reach her eyes. She was trying hard not to look nervous and failing badly.

“Sounds good to me.”

The atmosphere of the room completely shifted as the children scrambled to find enough dishes to put the hot fish on and everyone was portioned out a bit of bread.

He couldn't remember a more peaceful moment within these walls since he'd arrived there. It was still loud as the kids all talked over one another, carrying on at least three different conversations at once. But for once no one was making it a priority to let him know he wasn't welcome. Everyone just found a seat, mostly on the floor, and enjoyed their dinner. Agnes even said thank you.

No one complained that the fish was chewy and greasy and that there was barely enough to go around. They just seemed happy to have it.

-

His foot tapped restlessly under the desk as he looked over the neat and tidy lines of his father's proposed budget and the scrap paper with his own messy scribbling.

This was unrealistic. No matter how he looked at it, it was unrealistic. He didn't even have the money to take care of himself, let alone feed a bunch of ungrateful kids as well.

He would make it work. He had to make it work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story is really giving me the opportunity to write about the things I know best
> 
> 1\. Children  
> 2\. Chickens  
> 3\. Accounting
> 
> I don't know if it was clear from the way I wrote it, but Alva definitely gave Jesper more fish than she charged him for.
> 
> There's just one more chapter of shenanigans with Jesper and the kids after this and then it's finally time for Klaus!


	4. Egg Crate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just a fun night out with the kids.

It would have been a lie to say life at the post office became _nice_ after they came to their little arrangement or that Jesper and the kids started getting along.

It was more that they settled into a routine.

Every morning started with a cold breakfast of boiled egg or bread, very rarely both, before he chose his route for the day from the map that was now heavily marked with red lines and X's. 

And every evening he would return with a small package of fish instead of letters and they would all get the chance to have something hot to eat. Although, he was starting to wonder if that hot meal would have to start being every other night if things didn’t pick up soon.

The children continued to poke and prod and generally give him a hard time, but nothing had serious consequence.

He no longer even flinched when Yvette would run by, snatching his bag or managing to grab his hat as he walked to town. He always found them again just a little further up the path lying in the snow or stuck on a tree branch.

The boys were little social chameleons, going along with whatever the dominant mood and strongest personality was at any given moment. They could go from being enthusiastic accomplices in Yvette’s mischief to helping him with breakfast to telling him he was breathing too loudly and they couldn’t focus on the chalk dragon they were drawing on the wall - all within the same hour.

Joelle had become an unstoppable source of local gossip. Frequently telling him long involved stories of things she’d overheard other adults say that usually, _thankfully_ , she didn’t seem to fully comprehend.

And his interactions with Sophie had graduated from pretending he wasn't there to now staring at him for unnervingly long periods of time.

It wasn't great, nothing about this situation was great, but at least it was predictable.

Which was probably how they managed to catch him off guard so easily.

-

It was a night just like so many others recently. He’d been here for months and the days had been blending into one another for a while now. It had been another cold, bitter day talking to the brick walls masquerading as people in this town with nothing to show for it but sore feet and a few new bruises.

He’d gone through all the usual motions that evening. Food was eaten, dishes were clean. He’d set his uniform to the side and washed up as best he could with a spare rag and some boiled water.

But it was getting late and not a single one of the kids had made their way upstairs. They were also doing a bad job at pretending they weren’t watching him.

Just as he was starting to feel genuinely uncomfortable Nelly approached the desk, looking him square in the eye with the usual carefully schooled expression on her face.

“What do you want?” Jesper asked. He was too tired to deal with her picking a fight with him now. Why couldn’t they just go to bed already?

“Why don’t you take the bed tonight?” She offered.

“What? Really?”

“Of course. You’ve been working really hard, you deserve it. We don’t all fit on it anyways.”

This was unexpectedly nice of her. Which should have been his first warning sign.

“What’s the catch?” He asked, narrowing his eyes.

“No catch.” She said, calmly shaking her head. “You’ve been sharing so much with us recently so we thought it would only be fair to add you to the rotation and share the bed.”

Maybe he was too naive or maybe he just really wanted to believe she was being genuine with this little olive branch.

“Well, if you insist.” He said, standing up from his chair.

A restrained little smile spread across Nelly’s face. “Oh I do.” She said, sounding very pleased with herself.

Jesper headed towards the stairs, trying his best to ignore how every eye in the room followed him.

It was strange being upstairs again. He hadn’t truly been in the upstairs bedroom since he’d first arrived and the kids had promptly kicked him out.

All he had for light was a single dim candle and it was just enough to make out the shape of the room by.

A few months ago sleeping in this miserable little bed would have been just another way that this awful place could make him suffer but now it almost seemed like a luxury.

He barely hesitated to curl himself up in the thin blanket, but as he rolled over he heard a series of loud cracking and crunching sounds. There was something cold and wet in the bed with him and he thoughtlessly, disgustedly reached up to his face to feel what was there.

He pulled his hand back and into the candlelight. What he saw was thick and slimy and yellow.

Eggs. There were eggs in the bed. 

He jumped up, throwing the blanket aside. There were eggs in the sheets, under the pillow, stuck anywhere they must have thought he would touch but not see. And now there was egg on him.

He groaned and gathered all the mess into a bundle. As he pulled the sheets from the bed he realized things were worse than he originally thought. There weren’t just eggs in the sheets, there were eggs _under_ the sheets. Eggs that were now soaking into the threadbare mattress with alarming speed.

Jesper stormed down the stairs, arms filled with the egg soaked bedding. 

The room was filled with the sounds of smug chatter and poorly stifled laughter but everyone went silent when they saw his face.

He was furious and it must have shown.

They’d seemed very pleased with themselves a moment ago but suddenly they looked nervous, uncertain. Scared?

Jesper took a deep breath.

“Well,” He said cutting through the deathly silence and dropping the gooey sheets to the floor with a soft crunching sound. “Now no one gets the bed.”

All the children looked at him, dumbfounded.

“What?” Nelly asked, distantly.

“It’s ruined.” He said. “You ruined the mattress.”

“No. No, no.” She said, not even trying to deny that this was their handiwork. “It’s not permanent, we can clean it.” She didn’t sound particularly confident though.

"Go see for yourself." He told her.

The kids looked at each other and rushed up the stairs. Their frantic footsteps were quickly followed by sounds of bickering and shouting.

Jesper collapsed back into his familiar spot at the desk, dejected and defeated with literal egg on his face. 

Despite everything he felt himself dozing off, head lolling back as he leaned awkwardly in his chair. He didn't care about the increasing volume of the argument upstairs. Those kids could tear each other limb from limb for all he cared right now.

"Hey!"

Suddenly Yvette was there, snapping her fingers in his face.

"I think I know where we can get another mattress."

"Ok, and..?" He asked, waving her hand away from his face.

" _Aaand_ ," she drawled mockingly. "We'd get it back here a lot faster if we used that janky old cart of yours."

“You really think I’m going to let you borrow it?”

She rolled her eyes. “Not askin’ to take it ourselves. We need you to go with us.”

"And why would I do that?"

"'Cause the sooner we fix this mess the sooner everybody can get over themselves and stop squawkin' like seagulls." She said, clearly deeply annoyed with how the other children were handling things.

It was at this point Jesper realized that he’d completely lost control of his life.

“Alright, who else is coming?”

-

Jesper threw his hands up in the air.

"This is a junkyard. This is literally trash."

He stood with Oskar, Oliver, and Yvette in front of what was clearly a local dumping ground. A vast sprawling treasure trove of scrap, old furniture and strange shapeless mounds surrounded on all sides by a tall haphazardly mended fence with a colorfully worded warning for trespassers helpfully repeated every few feet. Apparently even trash was off limits to the wrong people in Smeerensburg.

"What did ya think we were gonna do, go buy a new one?" Yvette asked with her hands on her hips and an eyebrow raised.

"This is where we found Lucy!" Oskar told him excitedly.

"Of course it is." Jesper replied, suppressing a shudder at the thought of the lazy-eyed doll and her shallow grave behind the post office.

"It's also where we found Sophie." Oliver added.

"Excuse me, what?" He asked, looking at the boy in mild alarm.

“You heard him,” Yvette said. “So shut your gob and get a move on. We ain’t got all night.”

"All you said you needed from me was a ride." Jesper said, crossing his arms. “How do you even plan on getting in there?”

“We need to go up and over.” She said, raising her arms over her head and then swinging them back down dramatically.

“Nuh uh, no way. Not happening.” Jesper told her.

“Fine. We’ll do it without you.” She huffed, stomping off with the boys close behind her.

Jesper leaned back against the cart watching the children carefully seek out handholds and footholds as they scaled the fence. He wouldn’t be caught dead risking his neck like that. Trespassing on private property in the middle of the night in a town that didn’t bat an eye when people tried to harpoon each other in the streets.

He watched the three of them disappear over the top but it wasn’t long before he heard a loud, sudden crashing sound that had him rushing towards the fence before he knew what he was doing.

He found a crack in the boards and did his best to look in but saw no sign of Yvette and the boys through the narrow opening.

"They said they've done this before." He told himself, backing away from the fence. "Well, they implied they've done this before. But it's fine. I'm sure they're fine."

There was another round of tumbling, crashing noises followed by the now very familiar sound of children arguing. They were dealing with whatever the problem was by yelling at each other. Again. Good. Perfect.

Jesper rubbed his temples, looked the fence up and down, and got to work finding his own path up and over.

He landed gracelessly on the other side, his knees immediately buckling leaving him helpless on the ground for a moment before he could get his feet under him again.

When he found the kids Yvette and Oskar were arguing with each other animatedly.

Oliver just stood there, nervously wringing his hands.

" _What are you doing?_ " Jesper whispered harshly.

The kids nearly jumped out of their skin.

“He was tryin’ to grab that one under that whole big pile!”

“Well she wanted to get the one all the way up there!”

They pointed in different directions as they spoke over one another.

Jesper looked back and forth. One mattress lay at the base of a wide pile of junk, more than half covered in rubbish. The other sagged limply over the top of a towering pile of scrap. Neither of them looked like great options to him.

“How about we look for an Option C?” He asked with a grimace.

Yvette and Oskar looked at each other for a moment, then sheepishly agreed to keep looking. Oliver breathed a heavy sigh of relief.

Jesper wandered with the kids, straining to see some promising shape in the dark junkyard.

What they finally found couldn't have been more perfect. (Well, it could have been an actual new mattress but they'd already established that that was off the table.) It must have been dumped recently because it was just out in the open, still resting on a broken and splintered bed and not hopelessly incorporated into some larger mass of junk.

“Now how exactly do we get it out of here?” Jesper asked. The fence was more than twice his height and he didn’t like thinking about what it felt like just getting his own body over it, let alone trying to juggle a worn old mattress at the same time.

Yvette pondered the fence. "Guess we're gonna have to pass it over."

Jesper groaned and Yvette rolled her eyes, but the boys were already clambering up the fence trying to figure out how exactly that plan would work.

A lot of their discussion was focused on whether Jesper, as the tallest, should be at the top of the fence to reach for the mattress or stay on the ground to pass it up.

Jesper quickly made it clear that he would be staying on the ground for as long as possible, thank you very much.

It was decided that Oskar would take the position at the top of the fence while Jesper and Yvette tried to pass the floppy mattress up to him. Oliver went to the other side to catch it, although Jesper didn't really see what the point of that was.

The worn-out mattress was frustratingly uncooperative. It wouldn't stay upright and even when they managed to prop it up Oskar couldn't keep a grip on it. Eventually Yvette left Jesper holding the thing up by himself to try and help Oskar get it over.

They pushed and pulled but the heavy, almost shapeless mattress kept escaping their grip before they could pull it far enough over.

Finally the weight of the mattress shifted and it fell to the other side taking Oskar with it, Yvette close behind him.

Jesper pulled himself over and fell to the ground in a boneless heap.

"That was fun! Let's get another one!" Oskar yelled, jumping to his feet.

Jesper looked at the lumpy sack of a mattress they'd just hurled over the fence. He couldn't believe he'd done that even once. It was ridiculous to expect him to do it again.

But it didn't seem so ridiculous when he thought about the skinny bed-frame it was meant to fill. Thought about waking up with a crick in his neck and his head pounding from laying on the hard wood desk all night. Thought about the little shapes huddled in the dark at the top of the stairs, tucked in corners and bundled up on the floor.

That post office was furnished for, charitably speaking, one person to live in regularly. Not seven kids and a grown man. Maybe there was one small way to make this situation a little better for everyone.

"Yeah, let's get another one." He said.

Oskar cheered while the other two looked at him with their eyebrows raised nearly to their hairlines.

"What? You think I'm gonna go through all this and not get something out of it for myself?" He asked them as he stood up, dusting himself off. "I'm done sleeping in a chair or on the floor. You all can duke it out over how to share that dinky thing if you want though."

They were up and over the fence again in no time and their second go round went much more smoothly. They split into two groups, Jesper and Yvette going one way and the boys going another, and found another good-enough mattress in no time. Although, getting it back over the fence still took some trial and error.

They'd gone back for a third and had it nearly to the fence when they heard a sudden bang and a woman's voice, yelling loud and indistinct but clearly angry.

"Ok, that's good enough. Time to go." Jesper dropped the mattress and tried to quietly rush the kids, but they wouldn't give up on their last find.

"Oh come on, we're almost there!" Yvette whined.

Jesper fidgeted nervously in the snow for a moment. He was about ready to just pick these kids up and start chucking them over the fence if they wouldn't listen to him and get away from the clear and present danger themselves.

But the angry voice seemed to be getting further away rather than closer. So he settled for grumbling in annoyance, picking his corner back up, and trying to get this done as quickly as possible.

They had the mattress nearly over the fence when they heard more noise, now rapidly approaching. Not a voice this time, but barking.

Jesper's eyes went wide and this time the kids listened to him as he rushed them over the fence. They gave one last good push and the mattress went over almost effortlessly. The boys were already almost over but they hung to the side of the fence watching Jesper give Yvette a boost up and grabbing her hands as she reached the top.

Now it was Jesper's turn and he did his best to focus on the fence and not look around him as the barking grew louder.

The kids were still waiting for him at the top, looking more and more distressed with every second. He made the mistake of looking down and nearly passed out as Yvette and Oskar and Oliver grabbed his arms and pulled him over, all of them landing in an awkward pile on the other side.

They scuttled away from the fence and sat in the snow, as quiet as they could be, until the barking died down.

Jesper's heart was still in his throat by the time they had the mattresses strapped in and were on their way back. The cart jostled back and forth as Yvette and the boys climbed precariously over nearly every inch of space available to them, mattresses and all, talking excitedly.

-

Joelle was waiting for them on the porch and ran over excitedly when the cart came to a stop.

"Oh good!" She said when she saw the mattresses strapped to the back. "Nelly couldn't clean the old one so she threw it down the hill!"

Great, so she was probably still off sulking and fuming somewhere. At least they wouldn't have to move the old eggy mattress themselves.

Joelle eagerly jumped in to help them while the other three girls stayed downstairs, Nelly trying hard to look uninterested in their work as she watched Agnes and Sophie play.

They’d managed to get the smallest of the three mattresses through the door and up the stairs before they realized there was another problem.

“It’s not gonna fit.” Oliver said.

No, it definitely wasn’t. Even the smallest one they had hung generously over the sides of the little sleigh bed.

“What are we gonna do about it?” Oskar asked.

Originally he’d thought that they’d have one mattress for the bed, one extra on the floor upstairs, and the last one downstairs for himself, but if none of the mattresses would fit on the bed-frame then it was just a massive waste of their very limited space.

“Well, if you can’t use it we might as well get it out of here.” Jesper said decisively.

He wasn’t exactly thrilled to be adding another task to tonight’s to-do list. It had been an ordeal just getting the first mattress up the narrow stairs. But obviously someone had gotten the bed up there in the first place. So how hard could it be getting it out?

Pretty hard, as it turned out. The battered bed-frame was heavier than it looked and no matter what they tried it just wouldn’t line up right with the opening to the stairs.

Jesper was about ready to call it a night when they pulled back one last time and it finally gave.

They completely lost their grip and the bed went flying down the stairs, picking up momentum and narrowly missing Agnes and Nelly as it sailed perfectly through the open door and off the porch into the snow.

Everyone stared out the door in stunned silence until Nelly whipped around, glaring up the stairs at them before stomping off out of sight with Agnes close behind her.

Their work went much quicker now that they'd decided to just throw the mattresses on the floor, and it seemed to be working out pretty well. They had the first two pushed up against the walls, taking up most of the floor but there was still room to spare. 

“What about that one?” Joelle asked, pointing to where the third mattress lay behind the desk.

“I was planning on using that one.” Jesper told her.

“Yeah, but it’ll fit up here.” Oskar called from the top of the stairs.

“ _But I was going to use it_.” Jesper said, enunciating every word carefully.

“Yeah, _And it’ll fit up here_.” Yvette said, mocking his over-enunciation. “What kinda post office has a bed just out there for everybody to see? Use it up here!”

Jesper was pretty sure this was exactly the kind of post office where that would happen, but kept that thought to himself.

They pulled the third mattress up the stairs and it filled the last bit of empty floor perfectly, essentially turning the entire upper floor into one big bed.

He was honestly shocked when the offer to let him stay upstairs wasn’t met with any resistance, especially from Nelly.

In fact, Nelly hadn't said a word to him since they'd returned and honestly he didn't expect her to. She'd made a mistake, someone else had fixed it and now she was embarrassed. At least, that was his best guess. Why else would she be so uncharacteristically hands-off, letting Yvette take charge without a word of criticism?

But he knew this uncomfortable silence was probably the closest he would get to an apology and he wasn't about to press her for more.

If he’d thought it was strange being upstairs before it was even stranger being upstairs with the kids, but it would be a lie to say he didn't enjoy seeing how excited they were that the floor was now completely covered in other people’s trash.

The kids wouldn’t be settling down any time soon but that wasn’t going to stop Jesper from enjoying his first chance to lay on something softer than a wooden board (or a few dozen raw eggs) for the first time in months.

And how sad was that? He was just as excited about these dirty old mattresses as they were. All he could do was laugh at himself as he lay down precariously close to the staircase, giving the kids as much room as possible to spread out.

He was just beginning to hope he’d be able to fall right to sleep in spite of the noise when he felt a tiny body silently invading his personal space.

Sophie was wordlessly insinuating herself into his arms, rearranging them as she saw fit, completely unconcerned with his comfort. He stifled a pained yelp as she clumsily tucked her head under his chin, hitting his jaw and knocking his teeth together hard.

No one else in the tiny room said a word about it and she seemed to have fallen asleep almost instantly. Jesper sighed and pulled his blanket over the both of them, resigned to his fate.

Eventually the children settled and the room grew quiet and Jesper slept better than he had in a long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Words I never want to write again after this: Eggs, Mattress, Bed, Fence.
> 
> We're finally getting to Klaus in the next chapter! Thank you all for being so patient with all my set-up for Jesper and the kids! It makes me so happy to hear how much people have liked these parts of the story!


	5. Mr. Klaus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> No one knows what's happening or why, but there sure is a lot happening.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter took just over a month to write and there's lots of reasons for that, but the fact that it ended up being over 6,000 words long is probably a big part of it. That, and the big chunk of it that ended up being mostly a narration of part of the movie because I didn't think the story made sense or flowed right if I skipped it. That was surprisingly hard to write. Hopefully it's still nice to read!
> 
> Trust me, using the 10 second rewind button over and over again to try and figure out if you want to keep that little bit is not a very fun way to watch a movie. I'm very glad I shouldn't need to do it again for this fic!

It had been a few months since he'd arrived in Smeerensburg, a good chunk of the year already gone with nothing to show for it. Jesper was starting to feel more than a little desperate. In fact, he felt like he'd discovered some new post-desperate emotion that couldn't yet be properly expressed through words.

His daily “mail route” had at this point devolved into just aimlessly walking around town in circles for a few hours. It almost counted as having something to do, and anything was better than sitting in the post office all day feeling sorry for himself.

No matter how comfortable the kids were eating with him or sleeping in the same room with him he knew if he hung around inside doing nothing for too long he was just asking for them to start trouble. He might as well be begging for someone to torment him. It was better to be a moving target.

Although, leaving the post office wasn't a guaranteed escape from the children. It wasn't just Joelle who followed him around now.

“Are we getting fish today?” Oskar whined, walking close enough to Jesper that he was nearly tripping over the boy.

"Not today. We have food back at the post office."

"But that's just eggs and old bread!" The boy whined, pulling hard on his sleeve.

"Which," Jesper said, letting himself be pulled sideways as he kept his eyes forward. "Unfortunately does still count as food."

Oliver and Joelle trailed just behind them, excitedly discussing what they should name the (hopefully) hibernating toad they’d found somewhere.

Jesper knew that, theoretically, these kids had been fending for themselves alright enough before he got there, but the thought of them wandering around town on their own had started to make him uneasy at some point.

When he was on his own he might get a few rude remarks or rough encounters, but for the most part the townsfolk just ignored him. When the kids were with him they got dirty looks.

So maybe he didn’t mind so much if they felt like sticking close to him every once and a while.

-

Joelle and the boys scattered as soon as they got back to the post office that afternoon.

Jesper just wanted a moment to rest after completing his daily laps around town, but he found his usual spot was already taken.

Nelly was busy patching up a whole pile of old clothes with her little rusty sewing kit and had taken over the desk for the task.

He weighed the pros and cons of arguing with her about the use of ‘his’ desk for a moment, but decided it wasn’t worth the effort. Neither was climbing the stairs, for that matter.

"I'm just gonna, I'm gonna lay down here for a second." Jesper said, lowering himself to the floor.

“Suit yourself.” Nelly replied, eyes on her needle and thread.

"And how was your day?" He asked.

She shrugged. "Dug through the baker's garbage, buried Gregory Krum's good scarf in Eleanor Ellingboe's yard, stopped Yvette from feeding Sophie worms. Same as usual."

"Sounds like you were a lot more productive than I was." He muttered into the floorboards.

Jesper was starting to seriously consider just taking a nap right there on the floor when he heard a window open with a creak.

"Is this a bad time? I can see you're pretty swamped."

There was one benefit of having Mogens there, it temporarily redirected Nelly's ire away from himself.

She had paused her sewing and was watching the man with what could only be described as cautious fury.

Jesper pulled himself halfway up, elbows on the desk.

"Isn't there something better you could be doing with your time?" He asked Mogens, joining Nelly in glaring at the ferryman. "Don't you have a job or something."

"Well, I'm exactly where I need to be! I'm here to pick up all the outgoing mail!" He said cheerfully. "Of course, I understand if you've been too busy to get it all ready to go. Can't be easy being a single parent with such an _important_ and _demanding_ job."

Jesper groaned at the same time Nelly wrinkled her nose in distaste.

The wind rushed in past Mogens through the open window, blowing a loose corner of the map on the wall around wildly.

Why was it so loud? Was it actually that loud? Maybe it was just him. No one else even seemed to notice.

He couldn't remember it ever doing that before, but maybe he was feeling a little extra sensitive today. Maybe it was just that they had enough sense to not leave the window hanging open most of the time, unlike some people.

Jesper stood up fully to try and fix the fluttering map. And maybe as an excuse to turn away from Mogens, who was far too amused with himself today.

As he smoothed the corner over with his hand he noticed the little rectangles in the woods for the first time. They weren’t just random shapes, they were buildings.

“What’s that?” He asked, squinting at the map.

“Oh,” Mogens interrupted himself. “The woodsman’s cabin?”

“Yeah. Does someone live there?” Jesper asked, not looking away from the corner of the map.

"Well, sure." Mogens drawled. "Yeah, you should definitely drop by. Nice fella. Loves visitors."

-

"I wanna come!" Joelle whined, trailing behind him. "I've never been that far out in the woods!"

"Yeah? Well there's probably a good reason for that." Jesper told her. "And I'm not taking you."

"Pleeeeeaaaaase?" She pleaded.

"Joelle, he's not coming back." Nelly said from the front porch.

"Excuse me?" Jesper asked as he turned to look at her.

"Mr. Mogens wouldn't know good advice if it crawled under his hat and died there." She said, crossing her arms. "And if you think he cares whether you live or die you're a bigger idiot than I thought you were."

"I'm not going to _die_. It's just some man that no one else ever talks about who lives alone in the woods." Jesper stopped himself there. If he continued that train of thought there was a good chance he would talk himself out of going.

"Do you have any weapons?" Yvette called from the doorway.

"What? No! No weapons!" He yelled. "I don't need any weapons! I'm just going to ask him if he wants to mail anything, just like I ask everyone else!"

"Oh." Yvette said. Clearly disappointed as she walked back inside.

"Is that everything?" He asked, throwing his hands up in exasperation. "Because if I want to get back before it's the middle of the night I should really leave now."

"He's not coming back." Nelly said again, to no one in particular.

Joelle sulked back to the porch as Jesper climbed into the cart and left.

-

The trip up there was bad. Jesper honestly wouldn't be surprised if whoever lived out here only stayed because they decided making the trip back wasn't worth the effort. He certainly wasn't looking forward to it.

It seemed like the empty wilderness of cliffsides and trees would go on forever before the little cluster of cabins appeared out of nowhere.

It was achingly quiet. Jesper felt like just his footsteps in the snow were upsettingly loud in the still clearing.

He tried to hold himself up tall, back straight, as he approached one of the buildings. He knocked and waited, but there was no answer. When he tried to look through the window it was too dark inside to make much out.

He moved on to the other house-like building, past the empty stable. The lack of response making him feel a little less cautious about making noise.

"Hello?" He called out, after finding the door unlocked. "I'm in your house or... whatever this place is."

He didn't even know what to expect from this woodsman, _Mr. Klaus_. When had anyone even seen him last? Maybe he was dead? Jesper hadn't seen far into the other building but if this one was anything to go by nothing here had been touched in a long time.

"Anybody here?" He asked into the emptiness.

He briefly felt a cold breeze come through the open door before he heard it slam shut behind him, throwing the room into darkness. He went to open it again but it wouldn't budge no matter how hard he pushed.

"Of course. Of course this would happen." He complained, to no one but himself.

He quickly gave up on the door and lit a lantern to help him search for another way out.

"Great. I'm gonna kill that boatman." He muttered angrily. Maybe Yvette was right, maybe they did need that 'emergency plan'. Mogens was a dead man when he got back.

He swung the lantern around, getting his first good look at the place.

"What?" There was no way he was seeing this right. "Toys?"

The walls and shelves seemed to be completely lined with toys, every table and surface filled with them. Weird.

Another source of light caught his eye. A window, perfect.

He set the lantern to side as he climbed onto the windowsill.

"Now I can go home with the satisfaction of having accomplished absolutely-"

His private little rant was interrupted when he saw a shape pass by the window. A very large shape. A very large shape with an axe.

-

He'd rode back to town at a reckless speed.

The kids all stared at him as he rushed around the post office gathering what few things he could call his own.

"Hey Jesper?" Nelly asked, more cautiously than usual. "What are you doing?"

"Leaving!" He announced, throwing his things in a bag.

He missed the way her eyes went wide as the other children looked at him and each other in disbelief.

"I've had it!" He said, more to himself than any of them. "Better alive in the gutter than hacked into pieces!"

There was a confused commotion all around as he left, but it didn't slow him down in the slightest. He barely even noticed the door being shut loudly and firmly behind him.

He didn't make it far though before a large, familiar silhouette in the middle of the road had him pulling back on the reins so hard that the horse startled and the cart went sideways, throwing him off.

As he hit the ground Jesper felt certain that this entire island was actually some kind of malevolent entity out to kill him, and it was running out of patience.

"Where's this?" The man asked gruffly, kneeling beside him.

"What? I don't know. How would I-"

When Jesper looked up he couldn't believe what he saw.

It was that little Krum boy's drawing. The almost-letter he'd been carrying around with him since that first day weeks, no, months ago. He'd honestly forgotten he still had it.

"Wait." He heard himself say. "I do know."

-

"What's this?"

"You're a postman aren't you?"

Oh. It was a package. A package he was meant to be delivering.

They had driven up to the house in tense silence. Jesper had hoped this would be the end of things, but apparently not.

He took the suspicious package and did his best to shove it into the disused mailbox, trying to get rid of it as quickly as possible, though it clearly wouldn't fit.

"Come on!" He grunted. "Look, I'm tryi-"

Jesper turned to explain that this just wasn't working but as soon as he'd turned around he ran face first into the other man who was standing right behind him, still and unmovable as a statue.

"Ah! You're right there!" He exclaimed, jumping back. "So quiet for a disproportionately- I mean, strapping, uh... Statuesque-"

Jesper wasn't even sure what he was saying at this point but he knew he was saying a lot. Saying things he wasn't really thinking about, had been for a while now. Just filling the tense atmosphere with nervous chatter, like he always did. It may not have been in his best interest, but he couldn't help it.

Klaus moved his head very slightly and Jesper followed his new line of sight.

"What? In there?" He asked, looking beyond the fence to the yard filled with traps and the dogs sleeping on the porch. "You must be kidding. No way. Absolutely not."

As he continued to ramble on about how unfortunate it was that he couldn't get in past the fence Jesper felt himself, once again, being picked up and somehow suddenly on the other side of the gate.

"Why are you doing this to me?" He asked desperately, turning to shake uselessly at the bars.

He knew his mouth was running a mile a minute. Saying things about his Dad and a ransom. He was pretty sure he was about to say something like _'Look man, I have kids waiting for me at home! What are they gonna do if I never come back?'_ when he suddenly felt himself flying through the air.

Miraculously, he managed to land inside the house. Well, maybe not so miraculously. _Because he was inside the house._

Oh God, this was so much worse than the junkyard.

Everything was a bit of a blur after that. He dropped the package, found the door, and managed to get all the locks undone before his head was blown off.

And as soon as he was out he found himself being picked up and manhandled, _again_. This time with a bonus hand over his mouth. But Klaus had also pulled him out of the path of that shotgun and scared the dogs off. That was a plus.

"Ok." Jesper gasped, pulling the hand away from his mouth. "I've done all you asked. Can I please-"

The hand was back on his mouth as he saw a light in the window they stood in clear view of. He tried to get Klaus' attention before they were noticed, but he was distracted by what he saw through the window.

There was the little boy, the one who'd drawn the picture. He'd come downstairs with a lantern and he'd found the package Jesper had dropped in front of the fireplace.

The boy kneeled down and opened the bundle to reveal a beautifully made wooden frog.

Oh. It was a toy. Of course.

The boy pulled the cord on it's back and the little thing began jumping and hopping all over the room. Jesper couldn't remember ever seeing any toy move with such precision and energy, even with all the money that must've been spent on him as a child.

The hands on him loosened and Jesper saw his opportunity and slipped away while Klaus seemed entranced by the kid laughing and playing with his new toy.

-

He made it back to the post office, cart and horse and all, but of course that still wasn't the end of this crazy night.

He pushed and, for once, the door didn't give.

"Hey, let me in!" He cried.

One dark eye peeked through a hole in the weathered wood.

"You said you were leaving." Came Nelly's voice from inside. "No take backs."

"What!?" Jesper yelped as he continued pushing and pounding at the door. "This is a matter of life and death! Let me in now!"

There was the sound of shuffling feet and muttering voices from the other side in response to his clear distress.

Jesper looked nervously over his shoulder as he hit the door more frantically.

"Let me in, let me in, _let me in!_ " He chanted, frantically beating on the door.

It gave way suddenly and crashed to the floor hard with Jesper on top of it as startled children scattered in every direction.

There was a mix of voices all around him, some angry, some excited, some scared, but he ignored all of them.

"Ok, whatever you did to the door I need you to do it again but better!" He said, jumping to his feet and pointing to the wreck on the floor.

"I take it Mr. Klaus wasn't exactly happy to see you?" Nelly asked. The look on her face was _I Told You So_ personified.

"I don't know." Jesper said, throwing his hands up. "It was kind of hard to tell between all the manhandling and the trespassing and the fearing for my life. And now I'd really just like to make sure I live through the rest of this night, if you don't mind."

There was another round of overlapping voices.

"Did he follow you back?"

"This isn't funny!"

"Is he really that scary?"

"You're a liar!"

"If you think he's so dangerous," Yvette yelled over everyone else. "Then we should arm ourselves!"

"For the last time, _no weapons_!" Jesper said, exasperated. "You're not going to fight him! That man is a _mountain_!"

"Well what's your plan then?" She asked, hands on her hips.

“We barricade ourselves in here and stay as quiet as possible.” He told her.

Yvette did not look impressed. “That’s a bad plan.”

“Listen,” He said, nervously looking at the gaping wound in their defenses that was the wide open doorway. “If you’re so set on us getting weapons why don’t you tell me what exactly you think we have that would qualify as a weapon.”

“Um, a knife.” She said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“A knife?" He asked, incredulously. "Yes, we have _a_ knife. _The one knife_.”

"We've got rocks too!" Oskar added excitedly. "You can get a lot done with rocks!"

"Yeah!" Yvette agreed, happy to have someone on her side. "And there's, like, all these boards and sticks! We've got lotsa stuff!"

"Oh! Rocks and boards and sticks and stuff!" He said mockingly. "Don't know why I was even worried in the first place."

“Well I have the knife if we end up needing it.” Nelly said, holding the kitchen knife up for everyone to see.

“Can I be the one holding the knife?” Jesper asked, fidgeting nervously as he watched the girl casually wave the blade around. “Maybe?”

“No.” She replied flatly, looking him straight in the eye.

“Ok, good.” He said, giving up on the idea of arguing with her to return to sarcasm. “The door is still on the floor but at least Nelly has a knife."

They spent a moment staring each other down before Nelly started directing everyone to get the door back in place and to build up another barricade in front of it.

The kids and Jesper quickly put all their nervous energy to good use securing themselves inside the fragile building.

-

They all fell asleep at some point. They must have, because there wasn't a single one of them that wasn't startled awake the next morning by the sudden knock at the door. A very unfamiliar sound.

"Is it him?" Oskar asked, loudly enough that Jesper put a hand over his mouth.

"Mr. Postman!" Came a voice from the other side of the door. "We'd like to mail these letters!"

"No." Nelly said. "It's worse."

Jesper pushed himself up from the ramshackle barricade they'd made of the desk.

"What did they just say?"

He moved towards the door, but nearly fell over backwards as about half a dozen little hands grabbed at him.

"Don't open the door!" Someone yelled.

"Let go! Get off of me!" Jesper cried, twisting and turning and pulling away until all the little fingers lost their grip.

He pulled open the door, despite all the whining and shouting behind him, and found three dark haired little children waiting for him on the porch.

"What did you just say?" Jesper repeated.

"Our cousin told us if we write a letter to Mr. Klaus, he'll make us a toy!" The little girl at the front said. "He also said to bring you a penny each. It's not a letter if it doesn't have postage, right?"

-

Jesper couldn't believe after all this time he finally had some way of getting letters.

Of course he hadn't come up with a plan like this earlier, it was absurd! Trying to get 6,000 letters sent to one man because a bunch of kids wanted toys.

But the children of Smeerensburg were more than on board with it so far. He would just have to go back to Klaus and convince the man to help him with his _very altruistic_ idea.

God, he hoped his Dad wouldn't find some kind of fault in the way he met his quota. As long as postage was paid and everything was properly processed and delivered then there shouldn't be a problem, right?

Jesper was pretty sure there was no stopping him now anyways. He could feel the gears turning in his head as he laid out exactly how he was going to make this work. What he was going to say when he talked to Klaus. It was the only plan he had, so of course that made it the perfect plan by default.

“What are you doing?” Oliver asked as Jesper put the finishing touches on the meter he'd drawn to track his progress.

"Ignore him, he's an idiot." Nelly told him before Jesper could answer.

"Could an idiot do this?" He asked, gesturing to his handiwork.

"What, draw on the walls?" She asked, unimpressed.

"Hey!" Oskar yelled. "You got mad at us for drawing on the walls!"

"Yeah," Said Oliver. "And that's our chalk."

“Listen, if I get through this I promise I will get you more chalk!” Jesper said. “And I won’t be around to tell you where to use it either!”

“What are you talking about?” Nelly asked him.

“Once I get enough letters to fill this up,” He said cheerfully, pointing to the big 6,000 at the top. “Then I am outta here!”

“For real this time? That’s all it would take?” She pressed, looking intently at the graph on the wall. “Really?”

“Really.” He told her.

-

Getting Klaus to agree to his plan had been surprisingly easy. Sure, he had to keep up the midnight deliveries but it could be worse.

Somehow.

He was sure there was some way it could be worse.

It was a simple enough process. Kids write letters, kids get toys. Kids get toys, other kids want toys. Other kids want toys, more kids write letters. He had to hold himself back from trying to calculate exactly how many letters he would need those kids to write on average per day to hit his goal before the end of the year. That way lay only madness.

And he made sure to tell his little housemates all about how well his new plan was coming along.

Maybe it was a little mean, to be gloating over this to children, but maybe he didn't really care. They should be happy enough that he finally had a solid plan for getting out of Smeerensburg and out of their "house".

Of course, he didn't tell them about how often he fell flat on his face or how long he'd been chased by barnyard animals. That might have made things sound a little less impressive.

It was slow going but all in all things were running surprisingly smoothly.

Apparently, if Ellingboe kids and Krum kids could put up with each other to wait in line and get their letters sent then they could put up with this weird hodgepodge of clan-less kids on the outskirts of town too.

The kids from the post office weren't as quick to make peace though. Every morning when the other children arrived they all either watched warily from the back of the office as Jesper collected letters or simply disappeared entirely. Even Joelle, who was usually more full of friendliness than any sense of self-preservation, was nowhere to be found when the other children showed up.

But he could tell they were listening. Listening to the other kids talk about the toys they were hoping to get, and the toys their friends and cousins had already gotten.

"You know, you could write to Mr. Klaus and get some free toys too." Jesper said as he packed the processed letters into his bag.

"Postage costs a penny." Nelly said with a frown. "That's not exactly free."

Jesper rolled his eyes. "I could give you a few pennies. It's not a big deal. When was the last time any of you had a real toy to play with anyways?"

He could see the other kids were interested in the idea. Joelle was bouncing in place, the boys looked excitedly between him and each other, and Agnes for once looked like she desperately wanted to say something.

But Nelly was having none of it.

"No!" She said firmly. "We don't want your pennies! And we don't need toys from some weird old hermit!"

The rest of the kids kept quiet. No one speaking up against her to say that maybe they did want a toy, but no one bothering to agree with her either.

Jesper rolled his eyes and went back to filling his bag with letters.

A sharp breeze blew through a crack in the poor battered walls and blew the last letter off the desk. It landed on the floor right in front of Sophie who immediately snatched it up, staring at it intently.

“No, no, no. Please.” He begged, getting down to Sophie’s level on the floor. “Please give that back. I need that letter.”

He reached out to take it from her but she pulled it close to her chest and the look she gave him was a threat in and of itself.

“Come on, there’s got to be something more interesting for you to play with!” He scooped her up in his arms as he stood. He’d been doing that a lot recently. It had become a habit. She would pull at his pant leg or just stare up at him until he picked her up. And she once again let him do it without complaint, despite her firm grip on the letter. Which gave him an idea.

“Alright. You know what?" He told her, holding the girl at arms length. "You’re coming with me.”

“What!?” Nelly squawked. “No she’s not! You can’t just take Sophie!”

“Oh, OH!” Joelle practically bounced over, putting herself between the two of them. She’d seen her opportunity. “I can go with you and keep an eye on Sophie! Then Nelly won’t have anything to worry about!”

“No!” Nelly insisted. “How does that make anything better? No one is going anywhere with Jesper!”

“Well, I’m leaving now.” He said to the room in general, pulling his bag over his shoulder with one arm while he balanced Sophie in the other. “So you’d better hurry up if you do want to come with us.”

Jesper walked out the door without hesitation, not even looking back at Nelly, Joelle excitedly running after him.

“Fine!” Nelly yelled behind them. “Nobody ever listens to me anyways!” And she slammed the door as best as that poor door could be slammed.

The other girls were clearly unaffected by her rage. Joelle settled into the seat next to Jesper with a huge smile on her face, practically vibrating with excitement, and Sophie continued to stare at her stolen letter like nothing was happening.

-

Jesper found himself regretting his decision to bring the girls almost immediately. Sophie wasn’t much of a hassle but Joelle would not sit still at all during the ride up and Jesper was sure he would be having nightmares of her falling over the side of that rickety bridge for months.

She nearly flung herself out of the cart the moment the little cluster of buildings was visible through the trees, not even waiting for them to stop. Jesper had to grab her by the back of her coat to keep her from tumbling to the ground.

Klaus was waiting for him outside, and his eyes went wide when he saw their little group. Joelle bouncing out of the cart excitedly and Jesper holding Sophie in his arms after she had made no move to get out on her own.

Klaus opened his mouth to say something as he walked up to meet them, but at that same moment Jesper realized his bag had somehow fallen off his shoulder and was still on the floor of the cart.

"Here, hold this for a second." He said, handing Sophie over to Klaus without a second thought. The small girl fit perfectly in his large hand.

Klaus' eyes somehow managed to get even wider and he froze up almost entirely as he considered the child he suddenly found himself holding. Jesper barely noticed any of this as he turned to retrieve his bag.

When he turned back Sophie was proudly waving the letter she'd held onto so jealously in front of the man's face, letting him take it from her without any fuss.

"Oh, of course." Jesper huffed in annoyance. "Of course she gives it to you."

"Are these _your_ kids?" Klaus asked him in bewilderment.

"What? Oh, uh. They sort of came with the post office?" Jesper said uncertainly. "So I guess they're kind of their own kids?"

A troubled shadow seemed to pass over Klaus’ face, but he was interrupted from whatever thought had caused it by Joelle pulling at the edge of his coat.

"That's Sophie!" She told him. "And I'm Joelle!"

“Oh,” The man didn’t seem to know what to do with himself in the face of her cheerful introduction. “Uh, it’s nice to meet you. I'm-”

"I know! You're Mr. Klaus!” Joelle told him happily, interrupting him without a care. "Jesper talks about you all the time. He says you just sit there and look mean while he does all the work.”

Klaus turned to Jesper, eyebrows raised.

"That was just a joke! I was joking!" Jesper jumped in, desperately trying to defend himself before the very intimidating (and very important to his plans) man got offended. Of course she would repeat that. Why had he told her that? Why couldn't he have just kept his thoughts to himself for once?

"Really?" Joelle asked. "You seemed kinda mad."

Jesper did his best to convey how much she needed to _stop talking right now_ through just a look, but the girl wasn't much for subtlety.

Thankfully, her attention quickly shifted on it's own.

"Can we go see the toys?" Joelle asked, bouncing on her heels.

“Whoa, hold on. You didn’t say anything about that before we left." Jesper said. "I don’t think that’s such a good idea.” He could just imagine the sheer destructive potential of letting the two girls loose on all those toys, the backbone of this whole operation.

“Of course they can see the toys.” Klaus said, more to Joelle than to Jesper.

-

When the door swung open Joelle gasped and Sophie's eyes were as big as saucers. The mess and clutter and dust didn't seem to dampen their excitement in the slightest. For once Joelle seemed to be at a loss for words. She simply looked up to Klaus for permission, and when he nodded she rushed into the treasure trove of toys with an excited giggle, Sophie close behind.

Jesper dropped his mailbag on the table they'd cleared for the purpose of reading letters and matching toys to kids.

But Klaus seemed to be frozen in place, watching the girls look through the clutter to find something to play with.

"Look Sophie! It's a bear!" Joelle said, holding a wooden bear on wheels close to the other girl's face and giggling in between fake roars.

Sophie didn't pay her any attention, instead carefully lining up a set of small wooden people before knocking them all over and lining them up again a different way.

"Hey," Jesper called, waving a handful of letters over his head. "We've got work to do. Remember?"

His words seemed to break the man out of his trance. "Oh, right. Yes, of course we do."

Klaus looked over his shoulder at the girls again as he joined Jesper at the table.

He seemed to have a hard time focusing with them playing in the same room and Jesper kept catching him paying more attention to the girls then to the letters and gifts they were working on.

He couldn't exactly call him out for it. He kept looking over at them playing too, mostly to make sure they weren't breaking anything or that they hadn't disappeared somewhere when things got suspiciously quiet.

Eventually they had everything finished, despite the distraction, and the cart was loaded and ready to go.

"Alright, come on. Time to go." He told the girls.

"Do we have to?" Joelle whined. "Can we come back?"

"Oh, I don't think that's gonna happen." Jesper told her, already bracing himself for the inevitable fit she would throw. "We've already bothered Mr. Klaus enough, showing up like this and ruining his peace and quiet."

"Oh, no." Klaus cut in. "They really weren't any trouble. I don't have any problem if, uh. If you'd like to bring them with you again."

"Really?" Jesper and Joelle asked at the same time. Jesper with a bit of shock and Joelle in excitement.

"Well, I mean if it's not..." Klaus began, not seeming entirely sure of what he was trying to say. Or what to do with his hands or where to look for that matter.

"Oh, well. If you're sure they're not a problem." Jesper replied. "I mean, they're kind of always a problem but-"

His trailing reply was interrupted by Sophie making her demand to be held again known by tugging firmly at the leg of his pants. Jesper picked her up and she fell asleep in his arms almost immediately.

"Would you mind taking the reins this time?" He asked Klaus, unconsciously tucking the sleeping girl's head under his chin. "Trust me, setting her down is not an option."

"Oh, of course." Klaus replied, but only after a few awkward moments of staring at the two of them with an indecipherable look on his face.

It was a tight fit, all four of them squeezed into that little cart. Well not much tighter than usual, actually. Joelle squeezed in-between Klaus and himself while Jesper held on tight to Sophie. Tighter, when they crossed some of the more precarious parts of the trip. He found himself shifting as far as he could from the edge of the seat, pressing himself into the side of Klaus' arm.

Joelle didn't seem to pay him any mind as she was squished even further. She was too busy telling Klaus all about which toys she had played with and that she liked the animal ones best. Every animal she mentioned seemed to be her favorite animal and she went into great length explaining what she liked about each until she ran into trouble trying to describe an animal she hadn't recognized.

Klaus gently interrupted her struggle to find the right words to tell her what _exotic creature_ the toy in question had been modeled after.

Suddenly Jesper found himself listening to this big quiet man calmly and patiently explain what a lemur was. And Joelle was listening too! He had her full attention as she sat quietly with a look of awe and wonder in her eyes.

It was the most he'd ever heard the man say in one go, more than all his other words before now combined, and it was the longest he'd ever seen Joelle stay quiet while still conscious. Jesper stayed quiet too. He was scared that if he said anything this odd little moment would be ruined.

He was worried Joelle would be reluctant to say goodbye, but when they got to the post office she jumped out of the cart with barely even a _goodnight_ before she was running to the door.

"If she wakes the rest of them up, I _swear_..." Jesper muttered to himself.

"There's _more_ of them?" Klaus asked. 

"Oh yeah. There's a whole infestation of them in there." Jesper said, nodding his head towards the post office. "And they spend all their time trying to make me as miserable as possible. Those kids hate me." 

"Uh huh." Klaus said, looking down to where Jesper held the sleeping Sophie tight to his chest. 

"Trust me, I know they look cute but they're all really little monsters." Jesper told him. 

"I'm sure they are." Klaus replied softly. 

Jesper was ready to keep up his argument against the kids, but when he saw the little smile that had crept over the other man's face he paused. 

"Let me go, uh. Let me go lay her down real quick so we can get on with the rest of our night." He ended up saying. "Be right back." 

And with that Jesper made his way up the steps and into the post office, where there were still dim lights on in the windows. 

\- 

From Klaus' perspective all he heard was a loud _"Why aren't you sleeping!?"_ from somewhere inside the small building as he sat outside by himself, still trying to wrap his head around what exactly just happened. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is so much in this chapter that I've been thinking about for literally months! I'm so glad to have it written now! I've been so excited about Jesper just straight up handing Klaus a child!!! It was so hard not to tell anyone about it!
> 
> I've already been working out the structure of the next 2 chapters, to make sure everything ends up in the right place, and I'm just as excited for what's coming next as I was to get this done! I think I'll keep any hints or teases to myself this time though.


	6. Little Helpers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life at the post office has gone through some changes recently, and everyone is reacting a little differently.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (This chapter includes a few scenes that I had originally posted on tumblr before I really started working on this story. I wasn't going to include them, but it felt like they added a lot to the emotional development so I re-edited them and put them here. They're not a huge portion of the word count, and one of them is much more heavily reworked than the other. So if you've been following me on tumblr, a little bit of this might seem familiar!)
> 
> Also, my very good friend Lisondraws made some amazing art of my kids for me! Check it out [here](https://lisondraws.tumblr.com/post/615591064074633216/art-trade-with-my-good-friend-kitlaurie-here-are) (and if you haven't seen her other art for this au yet you should really check that out too!)

It had been almost a week since the late night toy deliveries had started and things were going, uh they were, well...

They were going.

Jesper hadn’t even noticed how little he’d really interacted with anyone outside the post office until things had suddenly started getting very eventful very quickly.

Sending the kids who couldn’t write their own letters over to Alva had mostly been an off-hand remark, maybe he’d had a passing thought that she might be happy to get some students, but it would be a vast overestimation of how much he cared to say he’d put any more thought into it than that. So having her angrily confront him in the streets the next day had caught him more than a little off guard. He liked to think he bounced back pretty well though, no matter what Mogens had to say on the matter.

And that little Saami girl kept coming back every day, even though she clearly wasn’t getting what she wanted. Jesper didn’t have to actually know what she was saying to understand that much.

At first she seemed to leave not long after her failed attempts to talk with him. Once the kids of Smeerensburg cleared out she always seemed to disappear back to wherever it was she came from. However, once she’d noticed that there were some kids left hanging around after all the letters were handed over she decided to stick around too.

Staying inside and away from the Krum and Ellingboe children in the mornings was already starting to wear on the younger residents of the post office, who were still more than a little displeased to see their territory being encroached on even further. By the time ‘the enemy’ had cleared out they were so eager to go out and play you’d have thought they hadn’t been outside in months.

Unsurprisingly, they didn’t respond well to having a new playmate chattering away at them, trying to insinuate herself into games she wasn’t wanted in and didn’t understand.

Jesper was still leaning on the bottom of the half open double-hung door one morning, watching the Saami girl utterly fail at her attempts to make new friends for the third day in a row.

She tried to push her way into Yvette and the boys’ roughhousing, but they refused to lay a finger on her and moved further and further away until the three of them climbed up a tree, Yvette brandishing a branch rather threateningly. Which is when she finally gave up.

Next she moved on to where the old sleigh bed still sat in front of the post office. Nelly was leading Joelle and Agnes in a game of pretend, making preparations for some make believe trip. At first the girls tried to continue packing their imaginary things and checking their itinerary without acknowledging their unwanted guest, Nelly keeping a close eye on her as she circled the bed frame chattering away at them. This only lasted until the girl managed to corner Agnes, who was so startled by the stranger’s intense attention that she ran past Jesper back into the post office, completely disrupting the game.

Jesper almost felt bad for the girl, but he’d honestly been mostly ignoring her up to this point. She never seemed to get upset with the rejection and always left eventually. There were probably plenty of other kids to play with wherever it was she called home anyways. She just needed to take the hint and stop hanging around where she wasn’t wanted.

He watched this little drama play out and was about to head inside when he saw something that immediately had him opening the door and bolting across the yard.

The girl had spotted the one kid left that she hadn’t bothered yet.

Sophie had been quietly playing on her own, as usual, and had gone completely unnoticed in her little out of the way spot at a tree stump around the corner of the post office. Until now.

“No no no no no.” Jesper said urgently under his breath, hoping Sophie wouldn’t notice either of them running towards her.

But when the girl reached Sophie first there wasn’t the sudden, angry explosion that he’d been expecting.

Sophie barely glanced at the girl as she talked excitedly. She simply rearranged the assortment of rocks and pine-cones and old shingles that she had in front of her, offering the other girl a pine-cone and pretending to pour something into it with an oddly shaped branch when the girl sat down across from her at the stump.

It seemed she was having a tea party, and for some reason she had no problem with the older girl joining her for a cup of invisible tea and some incomprehensible chatter.

Jesper collapsed onto the ground right where he was, suddenly exhausted.

Even with so much of his day dedicated to his new routine, Smeerensburg still found time to throw new and confusing obstacles at him. Kids acting weirder than usual, angry teacher yelling at him in the streets, and a “business partner” who was only becoming more and more inscrutable.

Jesper hadn’t brought any of the kids with him to see Klaus again. Why would he?

He wasn’t exactly sure what had happened the night the girls had tagged along with him, but Klaus had retreated back into himself a bit since then. He was far from the unapproachable silently looming figure he had been when they first met, but there almost seemed to be some new awkwardness between them.

But even with more and more letters coming in every day the work had started going quicker. Breaking and entering might not be the kind of skill Jesper would be boasting about once this was all over, but he was definitely getting good at it. And Klaus had shown a certain knack for picking the right toy for every kid, even when they weren’t particularly clear in their letters.

And overall, despite the long risky nights and selectively silent partner, everything seemed to be looking up.

-

Jesper had never felt so miserable in his life.

Everything ached, his limbs were on fire, his head was pounding, and his whole body just felt heavy.

It was becoming increasingly obvious that, despite some minor improvements, this situation was still not ideal. Long nights, heavy physical activity, and the nagging fear that this plan could crumble out from under him at any moment were all clearly taking their toll.

And while he wouldn’t want to go back to sleeping at his desk, a few hours of rough sleep on junkyard mattresses and a quick cup of cheap coffee weren’t quite cutting it either.

He’d also noticed a drastic uptick in mysterious unexplained bruises recently, and he was pretty sure they weren’t all from climbing down chimneys.

Pros of sharing a sleeping space with the kids: much warmer, marginally fewer chickens.

Cons: Dozens of elbows, knees, and heels in his rib-cage. Somehow, even when most of the kids started the night on the other side of the room.

Waking up had been a terrible mistake that needed immediate correction. He rolled over on the lumpy mattress in an attempt to get comfortable but the morning sun struck him dead in the face through the old cracked boards.

His eyes shot open. If it was late enough that the sun could cut through the upper story of the post office than it was late enough for the kids of Smeerensburg to be waiting for him, letters at the ready.

As much as it pained him he pulled himself up, feeling no shame in taking his thin blanket with him, and made his way downstairs with more care than was strictly necessary.

He had expected, at most, the sounds of frustrated children waiting outside of the closed post office complaining about their letters going undelivered or pounding on the poor rickety door to try and get his attention. 

What he didn't expect was the sight of a bustling post office, in miniature.

At the open door Joelle and Agnes were displaying excellent customer service by accepting the children's letters with a cheerful "thank you". The letters were then handed off to Oliver, who was carefully laying them flat on the floor and pairing each one with a penny to ensure all postage was paid. To the side Yvette and Oskar were sorting the processed mail while frequently referencing a large sheet of paper with the alphabet written on it in Nelly's blocky and meticulous handwriting. 

Nelly herself was seated behind the old desk, stamping each letter with the utmost care using an old used envelope for reference. Her shoulders were tense and her brow was deeply furrowed in concentration. It was a stance more suited to performing surgery than just using a rubber stamp on some paper.

"Well, I'm not really sure you're allowed to be doing this," Jesper said over her shoulder. "But looks like you're doing a pretty good job. Might be a future for you in the postal service."

She turned to him clearly caught off guard, but for a moment the tension in her shoulders eased.

Just for a moment.

"Well, we wouldn't have to be doing your job if you could actually take care of yourself and get out of bed on time. We'll never get rid of you if these letters don't get sent." She crossed her arms and scowled at him. "You might as well just go back to bed, you look awful. You better pull yourself together before tonight. Mr. Klaus isn't gonna deliver those toys by himself."

He opened his mouth to reply but was interrupted by a loud, angry noise. Behind him Sophie stood next to the stairs, smacking the first step as hard as she could with her little hand and giving him a stern look.

"Y'know what," he said after a moment. "I will. Who am I to turn down a day off."

At that Sophie scrambled up the stairs and Nelly turned back to her work, looking just a little more at ease.

Once back upstairs Sophie rushed over to one of the mattresses on the floor, patting it with her hand. She laid her head down, keeping eye contact with him. Apparently this was her way of telling him to go back to bed.

Jesper tried to suppress his smile as he obeyed and laid down again, pulling his blanket over his shoulders.

Sophie picked her head back up, looking somewhat mollified. She moved over to him and began pushing at the edges of the blanket, messily tucking him in.

When she was done she returned to the stairs but stopped at the top and fixed him with a long, serious stare only returning to the post office proper when she seemed convinced he would be staying put.

-

He never slept in that late again, and even though he’d never asked for their help the kids continued to help him collect and sort the letters from that day forward. Not all of them every time, but there was usually at least one of them standing by the door or helping to alphabetize the ever growing stacks of letters.

It wasn’t until about the seventh time he heard Nelly carefully and slowly reciting the alphabet while helping one of the other kids sort letters that he realized she was probably the only one of them who actually had it memorized.

“Hey,” He said one morning, addressing the room after things had slowed down and the post office had emptied of all the children who didn’t call it home. “Why don’t you guys go see if Alva’s actually gotten around to teaching those kids I sent her way?”

They all stared at him like he’d grown two heads.

“Why would we do that?” Oliver asked slowly, blinking up at him in bewilderment.

“Yeah,” Yvette added. “Don’t see the point of wandering right into that mess. If they wanna make us miserable they should at least have to come find us first.”

It was with great effort that Jesper held back the sarcastic reply he wanted to give. Those kids had been here every morning since this all started and, aside from pulling a few rude faces, had done nothing specifically nasty to the post office’s residents. Maybe things were still different when they saw each other in town. How was he to know?

He didn’t want to tell them directly that he thought they should probably go learn something themselves, they had a strong aversion to anything that sounded like him telling them what to do.

But he didn’t have to worry long about finding a more convincing argument, opinions on the subject were already divided.

“Well I want to see what they’re doing!” Joelle said. “We can at least go peek in the windows!”

“And even if she’s not teaching,” Oskar added excitedly. “We can still see all the fish guts!”

Jesper grimaced. “Yes, lovely. Run along and go see the fish guts.”

As he went back to work he noticed Nelly was just standing in the doorway watching Yvette, Joelle, and the boys as they walked further and further from the post office.

“You not going?” He asked her.

“I don’t need to go to school.” She said confidently. “I already know how to read and do sums, and everything else I can figure out on my own.”

Jesper leaned against the door-frame, considering the girl’s stiff posture and stubborn expression as she looked down the road. Why did he even care if she wanted to go or not? What did it matter to him?

“If you say so.” He muttered and went inside.

Things didn’t stay calm for long though.

Agnes and Nelly had barely stepped foot back in the post office before he heard the unmistakable and now very familiar sounds of children arguing.

“I wanna go! I do!” Agnes whined, much louder than was normal for her.

“Then go.” Nelly told her dismissively.

“But will you come with me? Please?” Agnes begged her. “I don’t wanna go by myself.”

“Well then you should’ve left with everyone else!” Nelly snapped at her. “I’m not going to that school.”

Agnes looked absolutely miserable. Jesper had never seen her go anywhere by herself and he seriously doubted today would be any different.

“Can’t you just walk her there?” He asked.

Nelly gave him a tired glare but Agnes was looking at her with big, sad, hopeful eyes. Jesper had never seen Agnes go anywhere by herself, but he’d also never seen Nelly tell her no.

“Fine.” She grumbled. “But I’m not going in. You can walk home with everyone else.”

Jesper stood on the porch watching the two girls walk towards town for a moment before heading back inside the now oddly quiet post office.

-

That just left him and Sophie who, as per usual, didn’t seem to notice or care about the changes around her in the least. At first.

It was quiet now with all the other children gone, quieter than Jesper could ever remember it being, and while he should’ve been able to focus on his work he found his mind kept wandering. The quiet was distracting.

While he slowly, distractedly worked through the stacks of letters on his desk Sophie, who was usually very easy to ignore, kept catching his attention. She was the only thing moving around the place now, besides the chickens who seemed content just to roost, and she seemed uncharacteristically restless. Jesper couldn’t tell if she was enjoying having free reign of the post office or if it bothered her that the other kids were gone.

After watching the tiny girl struggle wordlessly to open the front door on her own Jesper sighed and went to open it for her, propping it open with a piece of firewood so she could come and go as she pleased. Which she did, bringing all sorts of random odds and ends in with her.

Jesper was used to her playing on her own, never seeking attention or trying to get anyone else involved with her little games. So he wasn’t sure what to make of it when she began silently lining all her new little treasures up on the edge of the desk as he sorted letters.

Once the front of the desk had a perfect uninterrupted little line of rocks and twigs and feathers Sophie stopped her constant back and forth and just stood at Jesper’s side, looking up at him expectantly.

“What?” He asked her after a few awkward moments of enduring her staring, setting the rubber stamp down on the desk so she could see he was giving her his full attention.

She held up another rock, just about the size of her palm. There was nothing special about it, as far as he could tell it was exactly like all the other rocks she’d brought in.

“Oh, uh. Thanks.” He said, taking the rock and putting it in his pocket.

That seemed to satisfy her, because she nodded approvingly before going about her own business again. Whatever that was.

She was quiet as a mouse for the rest of the afternoon, leaving Jesper to his sorting. But he left the neat line of junk undisturbed on the desk and found himself frequently reaching into his pocket to fidget with that smooth little rock as he worked.

-

Jesper didn’t notice how late it was getting until he realized the sack of letters was ready to go and there was still no sign of the rest of the kids. Nelly obviously hadn’t just come straight back like she’d said she would. Jesper was too concerned with their absence to feel smug about her staying for the full day of school.

Was it normal for school to run this late? Would the kids still be expecting help with dinner before he left? What was he supposed to do with Sophie?

He was starting to wonder if Alva had detained his little reconnaissance team. Considering how his little chat with her had gone earlier that week he wouldn’t put it past her to interrogate the kids if she found out they lived under the same roof as him. Even though finding out what she’d been up to hadn’t actually been his main concern.

He was just about ready to scoop Sophie up and deal with her tagging along again when he heard a sudden ruckus from outside. The door flew open and the quiet post office was filled with excited chatter.

Jesper was not prepared for the immediate, overwhelming demand for his attention that followed.

Suddenly there were worksheets and drawings being shoved in his face and a loud chorus of overlapping voices all directed at him.

“Look at all the different colors Miss Alva has! She let us draw even while she was talking!”

“We made so many more pictures but they’re back at the school! She asked us what we were making and said it was so good she wanted to hang it up for everyone to see!”

“I sat at the front! I sat at the front but Yvette didn’t want to so I sat next to another girl and I don’t remember her name but she showed me how to spell ‘cat’ and we’re friends now! She’s my friend!”

“Yeah, I sat next to another girl too. Her and her brothers threw snowballs at us when we left. She was ok, I guess.”

Nelly wasn’t so eager to tell him anything, but she was clutching a large book to her chest with both arms as she tried to slip past him while the others had his attention.

“What’ve you got there?” He asked her. “Looks like a lot of homework for someone who doesn’t need to go to school.”

“Oh Nelly didn’t get any homework.” Joelle butted in. “Miss Alva let her borrow that.”

“Really? What did she give you?”

“A book.” Nelly muttered, clearly displeased with the attention she was getting.

“Yeah, I can see that.” Jesper pressed on. “What’s it about?”

She rolled her eyes and sighed, but held the book up for him to see.

“Geography?” He asked, leaning in to read the cover. It was an atlas. A nice one too, even if that fish smell would probably never come out. He was surprised Alva let her bring it home. “I mean, if that’s your idea of fun, knock yourself out I guess.”

“Thanks for the permission.” She snipped back at him with a frown before wandering off to put herself as far away from Jesper and his questions as she could.

Agnes still stood silently by the door, patiently waiting for her turn to talk to him uninterrupted by the rowdier children. Jesper did his best not to look too annoyed with the continued demand for his attention as she stood there quietly, papers clutched in her hands and a bright spark of enthusiasm in her eyes.

“Look what I did!” She said in a hushed but excited whisper, holding her papers up for him to see. “Look! This is my name. A, G, N, E, S.” She told him, pointing each letter out to him one by one. “Agnes! Nelly’s told me how to spell it before but I wrote this all by myself. Well, once Miss Alva spelled it the first time. And here,” she continued, switching to the next paper. “I copied the whole alphabet off the board. Now I can practice all the letters. Miss Alva only told us to work on spelling our names, but I want to get better at writing all the letters right away.”

She went through more papers of messy but clearly carefully copied words and alphabet practice, her smile growing with each one she showed him. Jesper watched her face as she explained to him how she was already getting better at keeping the lines in her N’s straight, watched how focused and excited she was and heard her go on and on about her day at school without ever hesitating or going quiet or second guessing herself. He wasn’t sure what he expected to happen when he sent the kids over to the schoolhouse, certainly not this. But he liked this.

Agnes looked up from her papers with a big bright smile and Jesper found himself automatically smiling back at her.

“That’s great, that’s really great.” He said softly, so only she could hear, as he handed some of the pages back to her. “Can’t wait to see what you bring home tomorrow.”

“Really?” She asked excitedly.

Jesper swallowed past the unexpected lump in his throat, terrified when he realized that his earlier sense of urgency had somehow left him. 

“Really. Now, it’s getting late. I gotta go.”

He patted her on the head and turned away before he could get anymore caught up in whatever it was he was suddenly feeling.

He walked briskly to the desk, gathering up his things without looking around the once again very full and lively post office. He was practically out the door when he realized he was missing his scarf. He considered leaving without it just to get away from all the happy chatter as quickly as possible, but knew he would regret it.

Considering that he couldn’t see it as he glanced around the post office, it was probably upstairs. He sighed tiredly and made a beeline for the staircase.

He was surprised to see the faint glow of candlelight in the far corner. He’d assumed all of the children were still downstairs, considering the noise, but there was Nelly huddled in the corner with a loose board pried away from the wall.

In her hand was a small locket with a single photograph of a young woman with her hair pulled back from her round face in a loose braid.

He knew he was making a comparison between a living little girl and a still, black and white image of a grown woman, but looking from one to the other, at the curve of their brows and the set of their jaws, the resemblance seemed unmistakable.

“Is that your mother?” 

Nelly jumped like she’d been caught doing something wrong. She looked up at him with a blank look on her face before giving him a small nod.

“She’s very pretty.” He said gently. This moment hadn’t been given to him on purpose, he’d stumbled into it and he could feel how delicate this was.

She nodded again, face softening uncharacteristically as she looked back at the locket.

“Yes she was.” She said, so quietly he wasn’t sure she actually meant for him to hear it. “And she loved me a lot.”

Jesper felt hopelessly out of his depth. He’d never in his life had to comfort a child who had lost a parent. Let alone a child who already didn’t like him and let him know that every chance she got. What was he supposed to say?

As he lingered in his own uncomfortable silence Nelly quietly slipped the locket away and distractedly rubbed her face and tried to tuck some stray strands of her black hair back into her bun before going downstairs to join the other children.

Jesper felt more than a little ashamed at the relief he felt that she’d brought their conversation to an abrupt end.

He found his scarf tucked between two of the mattresses and practically ran out the door, yelling a rushed “Bye. See ya later. Be in bed before I get back.” On his way out.

-

Jesper threw himself into the nights work, trying to keep his mind off of the emotional whiplash the kids had blindsided him with.

They were about a dozen houses in and so far it didn’t seem to be working.

He collapsed onto the seat next to Klaus, but immediately shot back up.

"Oops, almost forgot about these." He said, pulling something wrapped in a cloth napkin from his back pocket before sitting back down. "Hopefully they're not too broken."

"What’s that?" Klaus asked as Jesper re-situated himself in the seat.

"Oh, some of the kids in town have started leaving cookies out when they're expecting a delivery.” Jesper told him, neglecting to mention that they were technically left out for _him_. “Thought I'd bring some back home for the kids. They've been helping me keep things running at the post office so I figured they deserved a little reward."

Klaus cocked an eyebrow. “I thought you said those kids hated you?”

“Oh, they do.” Jesper said. The words ‘They’re just trying to get rid of me as soon as possible.’ almost came tumbling out, but he couldn’t tell Klaus that. “I guess they’re not always so bad to have around though.” He finished halfheartedly.

Klaus gave a deep sigh, looking sadly at the little package of crumbling cookies.

"And none of them want to write a letter? Still?”

“Well, I’ve tried to talk to them about it.” Jesper said, a little defensively. “But they made a fuss about me paying for their postage and that seemed to be the end of it.”

Klaus’ frown only grew. “Do you think you could talk to them again? See if they still feel the same way?”

This really seemed to be weighing on him. Jesper wasn’t sure why he cared so much, but there was something that bothered him about seeing Klaus sad after he’d seen that little hint of a smile the other night.

He would very much like to know how to stop caring about that. It was very distracting.

“I’ll see what I can do.” Jesper said uncertainly, not looking forward to bringing it up again with the kids. He wasn’t exactly brimming with ideas on that front.

They’d made their way to the next house by that point, giving Jesper his second convenient escape from an awkward conversation that night.

The house was one of the nicer ones in the neighborhood. Or, well, one of the bigger ones at least. And as Jesper had quickly learned, once he’d resigned himself to the amount of climbing his job now entailed, sometimes the bigger houses were the easiest to get into. Wider chimneys, upper story windows less secure than the lower ones, family members sleeping further apart from each other.

God, was he ever going to be able to look at _houses_ the same way again?

He made his way down the chimney this time, juggling multiple packages as he did his best to descend at a reasonable non-bone-shattering speed.

As he stumbled out of the fireplace he took a moment to reorient his wobbly legs before dropping the wrapped toys by the hearth. The room he’d entered was filled with a variety of family portraits of all different ages and all portraying generations of red-haired parents with their perfectly matching red-haired children.

As he turned to leave, back up the chimney, he noticed the portrait hanging centered above the mantle. Bright and shiny and new looking.

It showed a picture-perfect Ellingboe family, a red-haired man and three young boys who were already nearly the spitting image of their father. But they weren’t what had caught his attention.

It was the mother, a stoic looking woman with a square jaw and round face, her red hair pulled back in an understated up-do. She looked out at him from the frame with uncannily familiar eyes.

Even if he had never caught a glimpse of that young woman’s picture in Nelly’s locket he was sure he would’ve made the same connection. The resemblance was striking.

Jesper wasn’t sure how long he stood there, looking up at that startlingly familiar face, but by the time he made his way back outside Klaus was looking up towards the house with more than a little concern.

“Uh, everything alright?” He asked, as Jesper sat down next to him in a bit of a distracted daze.

“Yeah. No, yeah. I’m fine.” He said quickly, waving a dismissive hand like he was trying to clear his thoughts out of the air. “We’re almost done, right? Should be wrapping up soon?”

Klaus kept a concerned eye on Jesper even as they continued on their way. “Mmhm, just a few more to go.”

And that was that. Barely a dozen words passed between the two of them as Jesper stewed over his own thoughts, completely oblivious to the worried crease in Klaus’ brow as his eyes followed him in and out of every house for the rest of the night.

-

When he finally got back to the post office in the wee hours of the morning Jesper was surprised and relieved to find all the kids sound asleep, bunched into their usual little groups across the expanse of salvaged mattresses.

He collapsed onto the closest open space big enough for him, barely managing to shrug out of his uniform jacket and kick off his shoes, happy to put another crazy day behind him.

-

The next morning everything was business as usual, with a few small exceptions.

There had been some cautious waving and blink-and-you’ll-miss-it smiles from a few of the Krum and Ellingboe kids as they dropped their letters off, which the post office kids responded to with a mix of stunned confusion or their own surprised but enthusiastic greeting.

Sophie and the little Saami girl were playing together again, off in their own little world.

And no matter how busy he was he still couldn’t shake that woman’s face from his mind. Especially as he looked at Nelly, sitting there on the porch keeping a close eye on everyone as the children of Smeerensburg slowly filtered out.

Jesper knew it would be better to let it go, to just not say anything. It wasn’t something he was supposed to know. There was no good way to bring it up. The reasons to just keep his mouth shut were endless, but keeping his mouth shut wasn’t exactly his strong suit. And to be fair, he’d been using up a lot of his keeping-his-mouth-shut energy recently.

“I think I saw your mom last night.”

Nelly’s head snapped around, looking at Jesper with a strange fire in her eyes.

"You probably did." She replied, schooling her expression as she looked back at the other kids who’d run out to play even before all the Krums and Ellingboes had left.

"Don't you want to go see her? Let her know you’re alright?" Jesper asked, frowning as he sat down next to her on the porch.

"She doesn't want to see me." Nelly said sharply. “She knows where I am. If she wanted to see me she would.”

Her voice was steady, but she was shaking bad enough that Jesper could see her hands and shoulders trembling.

"I thought you said she loved you a lot." He said, pathetically. Absolutely lost in this strange tension.

"She did." Nelly said, her voice thick. "Sometimes people change their minds."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed this weird frankenstein chapter! It is once again much longer than I expected it to be! I think between 4,000 - 6,000 is going to be the new average word count per chapter from here on out. I've written a little of the next chapter and I can already feel it.
> 
> (And if I didn't leave enough hair color related hints: Nelly looks like a Krum but her mother is an Ellingboe.)


	7. Wholesale Goods

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jesper convinces the kids to write their letters to Klaus, but it might have been more trouble than it's worth.  
> (Also, a cat, a ferret, and a surprise parent-teacher conference. Not necessarily in that order.)

You would’ve thought it would help take the edge off things, having the kids getting along and making new friends. Not hiding somewhere in the depths of the post office or glowering across the yard whenever the other children came to send their letters.

But Jesper was having a hard time getting used to the sound of unfamiliar kids running around, laughing and screaming. It was hard to tell in all the chaos what were happy noises and what were the warning signs of a full on baby brawl.

Like right then, for instance.

Yvette, Joelle, and the boys had joined the other kids in a snowball war. Which was like a snowball fight, but with teams and rules and a surprisingly higher rate of sore losers.

And while the four of them were all on the same team the rest of their teammates, as well as their opponents, were a mix of red-headed Ellingboes and dark haired Krums. Which, thank God. Mixed teams always seemed to keep them from bringing any talk of their family’s feud into these games.

When the kids had first started sticking around to play there had been some attempt to divide teams up by families, but that quickly fell apart when the Ellingboe team couldn’t pull Oskar and Oliver away from Yvette on the Krum side.

So, rather than competitive games devolving into an issue of clan pride it was only a matter of regular old winners and losers.

And in that moment Yvette was being a very sore winner.

She was standing over a little Krum boy who’d been the last man standing only seconds ago, before Yvette had landed the final blow on him. Her shameless gloating was quickly drawing the ire of not only the losing side but some of her own teammates as well, who didn’t seem to appreciate the tone she was taking with their cousin.

Jesper was about to run and intervene when another child, a stocky little Ellingboe girl, came up behind her and dumped a huge fistful of snow down the back of her shirt. Then, when she stood up straight in shock, kicked her feet out from under her sending Yvette falling flat on her back with a loud "Oomph."

Yvette looked up at her in shock.

"That's what you get for not paying attention!" The girl announced proudly. There was no hint of malice on her face, only mischievous glee.

The two stayed like that, Yvette staring up at the gloating girl in stunned silence, until a boy, a cousin or brother of hers, yelled "Eleanor, come on! We're gonna be late!" And she ran off, waving and smiling back at Yvette who was still sitting in the snow completely gobsmacked.

Joelle knelt down next to her, muttering much louder than she probably meant to. "Why'd you let her get away with that?"

Yvette snapped out of her stupor and gave Joelle a quick shove. "Shut up!" She said shortly before standing up and dusting the snow off herself, still looking at where Eleanor had disappeared over the hill.

Jesper collapsed back against the door-frame. Even when everything was fine these kids were exhausting.

Now that the other children had left the next part of their new morning routine could start.

The kids all started filing back into the post office to take care of the few small things they did to get ready for school.

Yvette’s cheeks were still tinged red as she pushed past him but Jesper was more concerned with Joelle, who was cradling a small grey cat, barely more than a kitten, in her arms like a baby.

“Hey, no. No, no, no. Don’t bring that thing in here.” Jesper said, pointing at the cat as he blocked the door.

He wasn’t sure where she’d found it but the so-far unnamed cat had started following her everywhere recently. And if he didn’t, she would just carry him where she wanted him to go. The quiet little animal was shockingly tolerant of Joelle’s overbearing affections.

“What? Why?” Joelle whined. “He’s not gonna cause a problem. He’s really sweet!”

“Yeah, well, the chickens don’t know that.” He said. “So leave him out here.”

She huffed and pouted and even glared a little before finally setting the little grey cat down while apologizing to him profusely. Not that the little beast seemed to care. As soon as his paws hit the ground he wandered off to curl up in a sunny spot on the porch for a nap.

Joelle gave Jesper one final glare as she walked past him through the door. Not that it had much effect on him. He wasn’t letting even one more source of chaos into this disaster of a post office. Not when things were finally starting to look up.

He breathed a sigh of relief once they’d all made it out the door and down the street.

Now he could focus on how exactly he was going to get them to write those letters.

“I’d ask if you wanted to help.” He told Sophie, who was busy carefully arranging a line of chicken feathers on the front of his desk. “But I feel like I probably shouldn’t let you have scissors.”

-

One unforeseen benefit of the kids attending school was that they were all in the same place at the same time twice a day, making them considerably easier to wrangle. As long as Jesper was quick enough and loud enough.

“Hey!” He yelled the instant the rowdy herd came through the door that afternoon, talking to and over each other in an indecipherable wall of noise. “Come here! I’ve got something for you.”

The noise died down as they all looked at him in confusion, but gathered around him anyways.

He handed each of them a slim slip of paper.

“What’s this?” Yvette asked without even trying to read the paper in her hands.

“It’s a voucher.” Jesper explained proudly. “For one free letter delivery. No postage fees required. I think you’ve earned it.”

“Did you make this?” Nelly asked, taking her voucher delicately by the corner as if it were something dirty.

“Yes I did, but you don’t have to whine about me paying for postage.” He told her. “This is just plain old free. A bonus for being good little volunteers.”

“Your handwriting is terrible.” She muttered, squinting at the scrap of paper.

“Ok, y’know what? I’ve changed my mind. You can give it back if you’re gonna be like that.” He said, reaching his hand out.

“No, I’m keeping it.” She said, holding the voucher further from his reach.

“Good. Well, no. Not good. I’d really prefer it if you turned it back in with your letter to Klaus. Which you are going to write, right?” Jesper kept a serious look on his face until she looked him in the eye.

Nelly returned his look with a much sterner stare down. “We’ll see about that.”

She was trying to get a rise out of him, but Jesper didn’t give an inch. Only nodding silently, not giving her any new kindling to ignite a real argument with.

The kids cleared out. Most of them, very promisingly, talking eagerly about what they might ask Klaus for.

But Agnes was left waiting patiently on the other side of the desk, looking up at him expectantly.

“Did you need something?” Jesper asked.

“Miss Alva wants to talk to you.” The girl told him. “She said you should go see her at the school as soon as possible.”

Jesper groaned. What was it now?

“She didn’t sound mad.” Agnes continued quickly.

He wasn’t sure that statement held much weight. From what he’d heard from the kids it didn’t sound like Alva was showing them the same side of herself that she usually showed him.

But it was still early, and it wasn’t a long walk. Maybe it was better to just get whatever this was about over and done with.

“Alright, thanks. I’ll go see her now. So if anyone asks where I am, uh, that’s where I’ll be.”

-

There were no clues from the outside of the schoolhouse that anything had changed, aside from a few straggling kids still laughing and playing in the schoolyard.

But inside the shrinking stock of fish had been pushed to the side and the desks had been pulled forward into some semblance of order.

Alva stood at the blackboard with her back to him as she wiped it clean.

He watched her work for a moment, looking around at the children’s drawings hanging up alongside dead fish and the remnants of simple math problems being wiped off the board, before trying to get her attention.

“You wanted to see me?”

“Oh good.” She said, actually smiling as she turned to see him, dusting chalk off her hands. “Looks like your kids didn’t waste any time giving you my message.”

“Woah, hold on. Since when are they _‘my kids’_?” Jesper asked, frowning. “They are not, in any way, _mine._ ”

“Well, they talk about you all the time, you share your food with them, and, oh yeah, you live with them. So, for the sake of simplicity, I’m just going to keep calling them _‘your kids’_. Ok?” She told him as she took her seat.

“Ok, fine.” Jesper relented, sitting down across from her. “So what’s the problem? Did Yvette hit somebody?”

“What? No, I wanted to talk to you about Nelly.” Alva said with a frown.

“Oh, Nelly got in a fight? That doesn’t surprise me.”

“No! No one was fighting in my school!” She said, adopting the much more familiar tone of annoyance. “Shut your mouth and let me talk.”

Jesper threw his hands up. “Alright, alright. What did you want to tell me about then?”

Alva took a deep breath before placing a small stack of papers on the desk between them.

“Alright, before I get into anything else I want you to know I haven’t been particularly strict when it comes to classwork and grades.” She explained. “All these kids are coming in at different levels and we’ve only just started. I don’t want to discourage anyone.”

“Um, that’s... nice.” Jesper said slowly. “But what does that have to do with Nelly?”

“Look here.” She said, pointing to about halfway down the first worksheet where the heavy handed writing suddenly stopped. “I can tell she’s trying very hard, maybe too hard. She’s doing really well and then, just, gives up. I think she’s too worried about making mistakes and she’s freezing up. This is learning, it doesn’t have to be perfect the first time around.”

He stared blankly at the half finished worksheet, an unexpected sense of familiarity making his chest feel suddenly tight. 

Memories of evenings spent pouring over his schoolwork in his father’s office after the tutor’s had given up, his Dad gently but sadly telling him to just do his best. But what if his best wasn’t good enough?

Crying over his assignments turning into lying, turning into coasting on his charm, turning into flat out bribing his tutors and teachers.

Anything to avoid the anxiety and pain of putting in so much effort just to fall short. Never completely sure what he was doing wrong.

Trying to explain that it hurt to hold a pencil.

“I-” He took a deep breath, started again. “I think I know what you mean, yeah.”

“I may be wrong, there might be something else going on here that I don’t see. That’s why I wanted to talk to you about it.” Alva explained, tucking the papers away.

“Hold on, what do you think I can do about this?” Jesper asked.

“Just talk to her, ok.”

“Oh, ok. Right, I’ll just talk to her. I forgot for a moment that she’s such a pleasant conversationalist.”

Alva cheerfully and pointedly chose to ignore his sarcasm as she expressed her approval with a sharp smile.

“Good. I’m sure you’ll find just the right thing to say, since you’re so _good with words_ yourself.”

When Alva rose from her chair Jesper followed suit and went to leave, but she stopped him at the door.

“Here, take this before you go.” She said, pressing a heavy package with the unmistakable odor of fish into his hands. “Stock isn’t moving as fast as it used to. Gotta get this stuff out of here before it goes bad.”

-

Jesper did his best not to dwell on his own problems on his way back. His old, long gone problems. It wasn’t even that similar, the way Nelly was struggling with school. She’d only just started, after all.

Except now he couldn’t stop thinking about all the projects that he never even started because giving up was easier. How some subjects came so easily while others had little eight year old Jespie pulling his hair out. How quickly he went from being “such a clever little boy” to an “impossible student”.

Half a worksheet done perfectly and the other half completely untouched.

When he arrived back at the post office he was greeted by an unfamiliar sight; all the children waiting eagerly for him at the door.

“We’re finished!” Oskar announced loudly, in lieu of a greeting.

“With what?” Jesper asked, setting the heavy package of fish to the side, still distracted by his own thoughts.

“With the letters?” Nelly said.

“Oh. Wait, really?” He asked. “Already?”

“We wrote one for Sophie too.” Agnes told him as she handed over the little stack of letters. “Is that ok?”

“That is very ok.” He said, smiling as he took them from her.

Jesper was surprised by how excited he was to have these particular letters in his hands. Everything looked in order. Seven kids, seven letters. Perfect.

The thought came to him suddenly, of it’s own accord.

_Klaus is going to be so happy when he sees these._

-

Klaus was, in fact, very happy to see those particular letters. In large part because Jesper couldn’t hide his own excitement and had been waving them around with a huge smile on his face before he’d even said hello.

“Look what I’ve got!” Ended up being his greeting.

Klaus’ face lit up at the sight of him waving those letters over his head, and Jesper felt his own smile somehow manage to get even bigger as he walked up to meet him.

“Are those what I think they are?” Klaus asked as he took them delicately from his hand.

“Mmhm.” Jesper hummed proudly.

Despite their excitement it was decided that they would set those letters to the side until they’d gotten through the rest of the night’s work.

It wasn’t easy though. Jesper kept looking up to see Klaus looking at the separate little pile of envelopes, that soft little smile on his face.

But the work seemed to go quicker than usual and, before they knew it, all that was left were those seven little letters.

Jesper didn’t even have the presence of mind to be embarrassed by how openly excited he was to watch Klaus read the first one. To see his face soften and his eyes light up. To see him smile and even chuckle softly.

Until he was hit by a sudden sense of dread over what those kids might’ve written, completely unsupervised.

“What? What is it?” He demanded, half standing from his chair to try and get a look at the letter. “Is it about me?”

Klaus shifted the open letter further from Jesper’s sight. “Aren’t there laws about reading other people’s mail?” He said with a smirk.

“Oh come on.” Jesper whined, falling back into his chair. “I end up reading half these letters anyways.”

When he continued to get nothing more than an amused look from the other man Jesper grumbled and picked up another unopened envelope.

“Y’know what, fine. You keep your secrets.” He said, turning his attention to the letter in his own hands. He immediately recognized the meticulous and heavy-handed writing. “Oh, this should be good.”

Jesper grew quiet as he read through Nelly’s letter. Nelly’s very long letter.

Nelly’s very long, very frustrating letter.

“Why does she always have to make everything so difficult.” He muttered, reading the letter over again. He sighed, still staring at the words on the paper. “You wouldn’t happen to have some kid’s clothes just lying around, would you?”

Klaus seemed startled by the request at first, but then faltered, seeming to disappear somewhere inside his own head before finally replying. “No, no I don’t.” He said, voice soft but his tone heavy.

“Of course you don’t! Why would you?” Jesper said quickly, barely taking his eyes off the letter still in his hand. “And I shouldn’t even have to ask you that! She’s supposed to ask for a toy. That’s the deal.”

“Can I see what she wrote?” Klaus asked, reaching across the table.

“Yeah, sure. I mean, it’s technically for you anyways.” Jesper said as he handed it over, frowning as he crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair.

Klaus’ face fell as he carefully read over Nelly’s letter. Jesper knew why, he was still running her lengthy request over and over in his head, trying to think of some kind of solution even while silently cursing the child for managing to throw a wrench into things yet again.

She hadn’t asked for a toy, hadn’t even mentioned it. Instead there was a literal laundry list of coats, pants, socks, and mittens. There was at least one item on the list for each of the children and at the end a request for a new pair of sturdy black boots for herself.

Klaus set the letter down with a heavy sigh and a heavier frown.

“Well,” He said slowly. “I don’t know what I can do for her. I can’t imagine she’d be happy getting a toy after asking for all this. You’d know better than I would, you live with her. What do you think?”

Jesper had stood up from his chair and was pacing the room as he only half listened to what Klaus was saying.

There was really only one option he could think of. Well, one option besides give up and do nothing.

“I’ll take care of it.” He said decisively. “I’m going back into town. Can you meet me back at the post office in a little bit?”

“Jesper, what exactly are you going to do?” Klaus asked, looking at the restless postman with a furrowed brow.

“I’ll figure it out. You just finish getting the toys ready.” Jesper said, pushing the rest of the letters across the table. “Find something for Little Miss Contrary too, while you’re at it. She wrote a letter, she’s getting a toy. Whether she wants it or not.”

Klaus started to say something else, but Jesper was out the door before he heard any of it.

“Ok. I’ll do that. I guess.” Klaus said to the empty room.

-

It was after dark when Jesper made it back to town. A lot of shops were closed, and most of the ones that weren’t seemed happy to have an easy excuse to shut the door on him.

When he did manage to get someone to even entertain taking his business an old problem reared it’s head.

There was no way he could afford everything Nelly had asked for. Depending on who he was talking to he couldn’t even afford a single pair of socks.

And the worst part was, he wasn’t even sure it was because they were still artificially inflating their prices.

He was used to new clothes coming with a hefty price tag. Not something he would’ve even batted an eye at a few months ago, but now he was still just barely managing to cover basic necessities.

Jesper found himself wandering in circles. He’d rushed down here with such a clear goal, but now he no longer knew what to do. The more hopeless he felt, the further he wandered from the center of town until he realized he’d been pacing mindlessly in front of the docks.

Realized mainly because he got called out for it.

“Well, I can see you’re keeping busy.” Mogens’ voice carried from where the ferry was docked. “Those kids finally manage to scare you off?”

Jesper blinked tiredly at the ferryman, genuinely considering just turning around and walking away. Until something occurred to him.

"Mogens, you spend a lot of time in Smeerensburg. How do you deal with the crazy mark-ups on everything for outsiders?"

"Oh, I don't." He said. "Ya see, I've got what they want so they give me what I want."

Jesper ran both hands over his tired face. "Mogens what are you talking about?" Then it dawned on him. "You've got imports, don't you?"

"Sure do! The good people of Smeerensburg have done a bang up job making this cozy little island home but there's only so many goods you can get outta fish bones and last season's blubber."

"And who delivers all that stuff!?" Jesper narrowed his eyes at the ferryman. "You do realize you're cutting into my potential business, right?"

"Hey, calm down there buddy! I'm not wasting my time on pro bono delivery work. I bring in what I know sells and the people come to me." Mogens leaned back in his chair, arms folded behind his head. "No postal service required."

“Still sounds like the kind of thing the postal service should be involved in.” Jesper said.

“Ya do realize they have exports too?” Mogens told him. “It’s a pretty direct system. Don’t see what anybody’s got to gain by adding a middle man.”

“Fine, ok. Whatever.” Jesper relented, trying to get his thoughts in order before Mogens went off on some new tangent to entertain himself. “Do you have clothes? Right now? Kid’s clothes specifically?”

-

Jesper followed Mogens down into the hold of the ferry, which, he didn’t even know it had until just that moment.

It was cramped and he had to duck, what little space there was down there was crowded with crates and sacks and spare dock-lines.

Something rustled and Jesper jumped, knocking his head on the low ceiling. A little pointed furry face peeked out at him from the open lid of a crate, quickly followed by a long furry body when Mogens reached down to pick the creature up.

“Was that thing here the first time I was on board?” Jesper asked, eyeing the rodent warily.

“Of course.” Mogens said. “Reginald is an indispensable member of this crew.”

“So, you keep a rat around on purpose?” Jesper asked, eyes still on Reginald.

“Now, I get that you’re a bit sheltered.” Mogens said, with an abundance of false gentleness. “But if you can’t tell a rat apart from a ferret-”

“I know what a ferret is!” Jesper snapped.

He watched Reginald slip away from Mogens and climb from one crate to another before the ferret made himself comfortable burrowing into the depths of an open box of loose cloth.

Mogens offered no assistance, just gestured broadly at the bags and crates and told him “Have at it.”

The first few he looked through had nothing but household goods in them. Dishes, linens, and a few high quality tools.

Jesper pulled something large and green from the next crate. “God, this is the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen.” He muttered as he held up the shapeless, overdecorated frock.

Mogens didn’t miss a beat.

“Huh, would’ve thought big city guy like you could afford to keep a few mirrors around.”

Jesper rolled his eyes at the weak jab as he messily folded the already crumpled dress. “I’m surprised you know what a mirror is.”

“Yes, I’ve heard tales of these _mirrors_ in my travels.” Mogens said dramatically. “Never seen one myself though. Have to rely on the fickle whims of the sea to calm the waves if I want to get a look at this handsome mug.”

“Well, that sure explains a few things.” Jesper muttered.

Mogens just smirked and they both continued to give as good as they got while Jesper continued to sort through the crates of clothes.

It was almost friendly.

At least until the subject of the kids came up again.

“I mean, you’ve known they were there for how long exactly?” Jesper asked him. “All on their own, no parents. You never thought to do anything about that?”

Mogens shrugged as he picked the ferret up off the floor.

“Eh, parents are overrated. I wasn’t much older than most of those kids when I ditched mine.”

Jesper looked up at that very casual statement. “What?”

“ _What?_ ” Mogens repeated back to him in a mocking tone, scratching Reginald behind the ears.

Jesper’s expression soured. “Yeah, fine. We’ll just ignore that.”

Jesper continued his running commentary after that and Mogens still had a few jabs to throw at him, but whatever rhythm they’d had a few moments ago was gone.

“Ok, I think that’s it.” Jesper said, looking over the pile of children’s clothes he’d set to the side.

Mogens looked through everything he’d picked agonizingly slowly, inspecting everything and refolding with unnecessary care.

Jesper braced himself for whatever arbitrary total he was sure Mogens would pin him with, but when he was told the price all he felt was confused.

“Mogens, I do know what stuff like this usually costs. That’s not nearly enough.”

“Please direct any and all complaints to the management.” The ferryman said flatly.

“Management?”

Mogens pointed a thumb over his shoulder to where Reginald was rolling around on the deck. The ferret had made an enemy of one of the loose dock-lines and was gnawing and batting at it frantically.

Jesper watched him for a moment. “Y’know what? I think I’m alright, actually.”

“Pleasure doing business with you.” Mogens said with a parting tip of his cap.

Jesper climbed off the ferry, balancing his hastily wrapped purchases in his arms, getting no help and no further goodbye from Mogens.

As he walked away he felt something small and heavy fall from somewhere in the middle of everything he was holding.

He scrambled to catch the odd shape without dropping the loosely packed bundle in his arms. Whatever it was was round, smooth, small enough to fit in his hand, and slightly squishy. He held it up to get a better look and caught the unmistakable smell of citrus.

“Oranges?” He said to himself, disbelieving.

It was definitely an orange. A little bruised and soft, but still a good whole orange. And by the lumpy feel of the clothes in his arms, it wasn’t the only one.

Jesper looked over his shoulder back at the ferry. He wasn’t sure if he was going to ask what was up with the fruit or actually tell Mogens thank you, but there was no sign of either man or ferret on the quiet dock.

-

Jesper rushed back to the post office, where Klaus was waiting for him with the sleigh just like he’d asked.

He held his lumpy bundles up triumphantly. “All requested items present and accounted for. What about your end of things?”

“I’ve got everything right here.” Klaus said, holding up a separate bundle of plainly wrapped gifts. “Should we leave it here before we head out?”

“And let them sneak downstairs and open everything while I’m gone? No way.” Jesper told him as he swung up into the sleigh, placing the hastily wrapped clothes with the other gifts. “This can all stay right here until I get back.”

It was easier said than done though. Keeping that separate little pile of presents near by was proving to be a distraction. Jesper found his mind wandering back to them all night. There was an ever-present sense of anticipation that had him distracted and unconsciously rushing through deliveries.

It felt like the night’s work would last forever until finally, suddenly they were once again parked outside of the post office. A much lighter load in the back of the sleigh.

Jesper stood up on the seat to look at the fourteen wrapped packages that were all they had left.

He looked back to see Klaus watching him with an odd, soft look on his face.

Not quite a smile. An almost smile.

Jesper wasn’t sure why, but he couldn’t keep looking at it. He turned back to the small pile of remaining gifts but he could feel Klaus still looking at him like that.

“Those kids are lucky to have you.” He said, softly and suddenly.

It was the exact wrong moment for that statement. The shock nearly sent Jesper falling off the back of the sleigh. Klaus reacted quickly, grabbing him by the arm and turning his tumble to the ground into a tumble into his lap.

“What?” Jesper squawked as he backed up and righted himself in the seat of the sleigh, laughing nervously. “Well you should try telling them that. I’m sure they’d get a good laugh out of it. At most, I just barely help keep them alive.”

“Which is probably a lot more than they had before you got here.” Klaus said quietly.

“I, well-” Jesper stuttered, looking back and forth between Klaus’ soft expression and the cold empty night around them. “You’re making a bigger thing out of this then it is.”

Klaus’ face grew oddly sad again before he looked away. “Hmm. Maybe.”

It was only quiet for a few seconds but it felt unbearable.

What happened to the easiness and good humor from earlier that night?

“I should make sure all this gets inside before they wake up.” Jesper said weakly, breaking the silence.

“Of course, of course.” Klaus said, sounding far away and looking slightly to the left of Jesper’s face. “See you tomorrow?”

“Yeah.” Jesper replied as he tried to gather up all fourteen gifts in one go. “See you tomorrow.”

-

Jesper heard the sleigh pull away as he closed the door of the post office behind him. He sighed, but the discomfort he was feeling was briefly overshadowed when he looked at the kid’s gifts again. It was strange, that he still felt so excited even after Klaus had left. Hadn’t this all been for him?

Either way, he found himself letting that excitement carry him as he sorted and organized the presents into individual piles on the post office floor. When he was done he laid himself down right where he was and stared at them.

As Jesper lay on the floor, exhausted, he felt his tired brain trying to process multiple things at once.

The meeting with Alva, his strange talk with Mogens, leaving Klaus on such an uncomfortable farewell.

Oh god, that was all just today.

With all this strange energy he resigned himself to staying awake and waiting for the kids to get up. The sun would be rising soon anyways.

Fueled by equal parts frustration and anticipation, Jesper pushed himself up off the floor and started a pot of coffee with what little grounds he could scrape together.

He had just sat down with his first scalding, watery cup when he heard thumping and bumping and excited voices from upstairs.

He’d caught a few glimpses of children’s excited, disbelieving faces when they woke up early to see what had been left for them, but he still wasn’t prepared to see that excitement light up the faces of the children he’d been living with for months as they rushed to see what was waiting for them. Scrambling around to figure out which pile belonged to which child.

Yvette screamed so loudly that Jesper had whipped his head around and half stood up before he realized it was out of excitement.

She held up an intricately painted wooden saber, waving it over her head triumphantly.

Maybe he should’ve taken a second and talked to Klaus about what was and wasn’t appropriate to give her.

Joelle unwrapped a set of little wooden animals on wheels that could all be linked together like a train and pulled around on a string. She had a duck, a dog, and a cow and each of them made their respective noises when their wheels turned.

They were surprisingly accurate. And surprisingly loud. Joelle was yelling over them in her excitement and he could still barely hear her.

The boys had each gotten a set of small blocks. Oskar’s were all red and yellow, and Oliver’s were blue and green. Presumably so the two sets could be split up easily if they ever wanted to play by themselves.

It was a great idea. The problem was that the floor of the post office was now covered in about a hundred tiny, sharp-edged little wooden shapes.

Maybe he should’ve talked to Klaus about what to give _all_ the kids.

Well, most of them. Sophie was sitting quietly with her new set of nesting dolls. Repeatedly taking them apart and nesting them back together with focused determination as her new winter cap sat neglected next to her.

And Agnes was calmly admiring her own set of blocks. Not like the boys had gotten, small, simply colored but with a variety of shapes. Hers were all square with numbers, letters, or animals carefully carved and painted on each side.

She had them lined up on the floor in front of her along with her new set of blue mittens and her orange, looking between all three with equal excitement and a pleased little smile.

And Jesper did end up getting an orange for himself after all. After Oliver took one small bite of his, put it in Jesper’s hand and said “I don’t like this.” before going back to the intricate town he was building around his brother’s precariously tall tower.

It only took a moment of considering the piece of fruit, crushed and sticky from clumsy peeling with tiny teeth marks staring back at him, before Jesper just shrugged and ate the rest of the cast off orange.

It was only after he was left with nothing but the peel and his own sticky hands that he realized Mogens’ little gift-with-purchase had a downside.

God, so many sticky little hands. Touching everything. Even if it wasn’t the ferryman’s intention to torment him with orange juice hand-prints all over the post office, he was still going to blame him for it.

Jesper was busy helping Oskar fix the misaligned buttons on his new coat while trying to convince Yvette that, yes, she would need to put her shoes back on over her new socks no matter how warm they felt, when he finally noticed Nelly wasn’t enjoying her new things quite as much as the other children.

She sat on the floor. Her gift from Klaus, some kind of box with intricately carved but unpainted sliding wooden panels, set to the side as she quietly stared down at the new pair of boots she held in her lap.

“So,” He ventured. “You get everything you asked for?”

She looked up at him, startled, and then frowned.

“What? You don’t like it?” He asked.

Her frown softened and her eyes began watering just before she took a shaky breath and ran out the door.

Jesper sighed, pushing himself up off the floor.

All eyes were on him as he looked at the closed door Nelly had disappeared through. Which felt... Strange. It was usually her they all looked to when something upsetting happened.

He looked around the room, at all the confused little faces waiting for a solution to whatever this problem was.

“I’ll be right back.” He said as he followed her out the door.

He found her sitting on the porch, still cradling the new pair of boots in her lap. Inspecting them like they had some deep dark secret to tell her.

He had no idea what he was going to say but he’d barely even sat down next to her before she solved that problem herself.

“Why did you do this?” She asked, looking so lost and confused as she searched his face for something that would help her make sense of things.

“Well, you wrote the letter, you get your gift. That’s the deal, kid.”

She shook her head. “Klaus doesn’t give kids clothes. You did this, you got the clothes. Why?”

Jesper didn’t know how to respond to that. Why did he do it? To spite her? It had really felt like she was just trying to ruin things, again. Was beating her at her own game really the only reason he bothered to do all this?

“I mean, it’s what you asked for.” He said lamely. “It’s what you wanted, isn’t it?”

She stared up at him uncomprehendingly, tears in the corners of her eyes. 

“But why?” She insisted. “What’s the point of just giving us all this stuff? We don’t even need it!”

Now that was something he knew what to say to. “Really? You don’t need it? Sorry, I didn’t realize warm clothes and shoes that fit were such extravagant luxuries.”

Her face scrunched up angrily. “But why did you want to do it?” She demanded. “What do you get out of it?”

“I don’t know!” Jesper snapped. “Maybe I thought it might make you happy for once! Pretty stupid, huh? You sure proved me wrong.”

He stood up abruptly. She was still looking at him, confused and angry, tears in her eyes. He couldn’t take it anymore.

That feeling was back. The one he got when the kids all rushed to tell him what they’d done at school, the one he got when Alva called them his kids, the one he got when Klaus had said they were lucky to have him.

He wasn’t here for this. He wasn’t here for them.

“Well, if you don’t need shoes that actually fit then go find someone who does and let them have those boots.” He said as dismissively as possible. Then left her to fume or cry over it by herself. Whichever it was, he didn’t want to see it.

He closed the door carefully behind him. The rest of the kids did an admirable job pretending they’d been minding their own business. There was no way they hadn’t heard that through these shabby walls.

Jesper rubbed his face tiredly as he refilled his cup with the last of the coffee that had been left to warm on top of the stove.

He looked around the post office, at the kids making the most of the cramped space as they played with their new toys. Their nice new clothes standing out in stark contrast to the rest of their patched and worn wardrobe.

What was he doing?

He sat down heavily in the chair behind the desk.

“Ok, start cleaning up or you’ll be late for school.” He announced to the room.

“It’s Saturday.” Oliver said, looking up from his blocks with a frown.

Jesper took another sip of his weak, burnt coffee. “I don’t understand why anyone expects me to know what day it is.”

He continued to, unsuccessfully, try and convince the kids to clean their new toys up before the post office opened for the day, but when they started excitedly showing them off to the other children he was glad they hadn’t listened to him.

Jesper let them be, tiredly working around children playing and running in and out of the post office all morning.

Nelly had quietly snuck back in at some point and sat slouched against the back wall, shiny new boots on her feet and eyes still red-rimmed and puffy as she slid the little wooden panels on her box around and ignored the rest of the busy post office.

Jesper was doing his best not to doze off while collecting letters when he heard a faint, soft tinkling sound. A gentle tune coming from the back of the room.

He looked behind him and saw Nelly, hands still, staring into her puzzle box with a look of awe and wonder he never would’ve expected to see on her face.

He moved to the back of the post office and looked over her shoulder.

The panels on top had slid back to reveal the boxes inner workings. There were no special designs or extra embellishments inside, just a tiny world of delicate gears and tines moving in perfect harmony as they created their soft song.

“Oh, it’s a music box.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New longest chapter! (So far)  
> It feels weird to say "things are picking up now", but they kind of are. Not sure what the final chapter count will be but we're about halfway through the planned plot now. At this point I'll probably still be writing this by next Christmas!
> 
> And oh my god!!! I've been thinking about Mogens' ferret for the last 6 months (just like the rest of this chapter, tbh) so I hope y'all enjoyed meeting Reginald.
> 
> Things I gave Mogens in this chapter:  
> \- A ferret  
> \- A side hustle  
> \- The vaguest hint of a tragic backstory
> 
> Things I gave Jesper and Nelly:  
> \- A non-specific learning disability/cognitive disorder (because I'm projecting)


	8. Thank You, Mr. Klaus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The kids insist on thanking Klaus in person. What could go wrong?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick Warning: A child does get injured in this chapter. They're alright, but there is some brief description of an injury and a little first aid.
> 
> Also, this chapter picks up directly after the last one. Same day as the end of that chapter.

Despite the craziness leading up to it, the day started out relatively normal, relatively calm. Relatively.

Nelly was now nowhere to be seen but most of the other kids had gone outside to play and show off their new toys to their friends. It seemed like every child in Smeerensburg had nothing better to do than spend their Saturday running and screaming just outside the post office.

Sophie had come back in at some point, and she’d brought her little friend with her. The two girls had come in giggling, the little Saami girl giving him a cheerful “ Hallo!” as they passed by while Sophie just patted him on the knee in greeting before the two ran off and out of sight.

He wasn’t sure where they were, but they were still in here somewhere. He could hear them, moving around, laughing and chattering. There were moments when he could’ve sworn there was more than one voice speaking whatever language it was that Sophie’s little friend spoke.

In the middle of contemplating whether it was one or two little voices he was hearing, Joelle stormed in.

And then stormed right back out to set the quiet and infinitely tolerant little grey cat just outside the door.

The little guy still wasn’t welcome inside the post office, but that obviously hadn’t scared him off. He’d become Joelle’s little shadow and at some point had gained the name Chekhov, which Joelle pronounced with an odd throaty emphasis on the second syllable that made it impossible for Jesper to forget.

She came back in, arms emptied of cat, and pouted at Jesper over the top of the desk.

“There a reason you’re standing there staring at me? Is that suddenly more fun than playing outside?” He asked her, after she didn’t immediately start talking his ear off.

“I don’t want to play with Yvette anymore!” She told him. “She’s acting all bossy in front of everybody and then she doesn’t even play with us! She ditches us to go do whatever _Eleanor_ wants to do.”

“Um, ok.” He said uncertainly. Did she expect him to do something about that?

Joelle stood there staring at him silently, eyes wet and mouth pressed into a tight line, before she went to sit back by the sorting boxes where most of the chickens had congregated. Letting them roost on and around her as she gently pet them.

It wasn’t long after that when Oliver came in as well. Just Oliver. He shut the door quietly behind him, looking tired and sad.

“What’s the matter with you?” Jesper asked him.

“I just need a break from everybody.” He said softly as he pulled out some paper and some old broken crayons and sat in a corner of the room to draw by himself.

It was quiet again, but it wasn’t exactly a nice quiet. There was something unsettling about watching Joelle sitting still and silent or seeing Oliver all alone.

All the kids seemed to be in an odd mood, and it had been developing for awhile now. There was a shift in their group dynamic that started as soon as they’d begun playing with the other children, and it was causing some friction.

Some of the kids were finding the increased number of playmates exhausting, while others were becoming frustrated with how much thinner the other’s attention was being spread.

And of course Nelly still refused to have anything to do with either the Krum or Ellingboe children, which meant she was suddenly spending significantly less time with the others. Which in turn left room for Yvette to take on more of a leadership role, with debatable success.

Jesper took a minute after he’d finished sorting and counting the day’s letters, looking between the two quiet children and listening to the one, maybe two, voices that managed to stay hidden somewhere in the tiny office, before he turned and went upstairs.

Which is where he found Nelly, sitting on one of the mattresses and staring intently at the meter on the wall that he’d been marking his progress on.

“Oh, there you are.”

Nelly said nothing, just glanced at him briefly before returning to staring at the wall.

Well fine then. If she was going to ignore him then he would do the same. He turned his own attention to the meter. At least, until Nelly suddenly decided she felt like speaking to him.

“Are you really leaving when you get 6,000 letters?” She asked, resting her chin on her knees.

“Yep.” Jesper said as he filled in a new line just above the 2,000 mark.

“Where are you gonna go?” She asked, still staring intently at the wall.

“Uh, home?” He told her, glancing briefly over his shoulder “I’m sure I’ve mentioned that before.”

“Just home?”

“Yeah, just home. Where else would I go?”

“Home?” She continued, as if he hadn’t said anything. “With your silk sheets and fancy apartments and dad who sent you away for not being good enough?”

“Excuse me?” He asked, turning around. She had his full attention now. “What makes you think you can say something like that about me and my family?”

Nelly didn’t answer, but she did finally move her eyes from the wall to fix him with a glare.

Jesper wasn’t sure where _that_ phrasing had come from. Yeah, maybe he’d complained about his Dad in front of the kids a few times, but he’d never said anything like that.

But as he looked at her he saw the image of that woman in the portrait again, the woman in Nelly’s locket, with her new life in that big house. Complete with new very _Ellingboe_ children.

Maybe he did know where that phrasing had come from.

He still hadn’t talked to her about that. But hey, there were a lot of things he hadn’t talked to her about over the last few days.

Her mother, Alva’s concerns about her schoolwork.

But it wasn’t like it was his responsibility to get her life in order. He had his own problems to worry about.

-

The tension between the kids hadn’t completely changed things around the post office. It had it’s time and place. Once the other kids went home things seemed to get a little better.

Or at least, that’s what Jesper assumed as he watched them all out of the corner of his eye, huddled together and whispering with Nelly once again clearly in the lead.

He watched warily as she approached him at the desk as he packed the days letters in his bag.

“We want to tell Mr. Klaus thank you for the toys.” She said, all serious and business like.

“Ok, write him a note and I’ll be happy to deliver it with the rest of the mail.” Jesper told her.

She frowned. “No, take us with you. We want to tell him ourselves.”

“Really?” He asked. Although, if the look on her face was anything to go by she wasn’t going to take ‘no’ for an answer. And all the other faces behind her fell somewhere on the spectrum between stubborn and hopeful. “Alright fine. I’ll run the idea by him when I see him later.”

Nelly raised an eyebrow, looking at him expectantly.

“Oh, you meant today.” He said, looking at her determined scowl.

-

“Get out, get out, get out, _get out!_ ” Jesper demanded. Although, it didn’t seem all that necessary. By the time they finally pulled up to the lonely little outcropping of buildings most of the kids were practically jumping off the cart. “I swear, we are never doing this again!”

The kids all piled out, practically tripping over each other motivated both by excitement and the burning desire for freedom after being trapped and squashed together for the whole ride. Making that trip with seven kids was a level of chaos Jesper had heretofore thought impossible.

Well, seven kids and one cat. Chekhov had, according to Joelle, “stowed away” and the little guy was quiet enough that Jesper hadn’t even noticed him until they were almost half way there.

But the look Klaus had on his face more than made up for the experience of navigating the treacherous landscape with seven loud, excited, bickering children who all seemed deathly allergic to keeping their hands to themselves.

Joelle and Sophie led the way, excited to see him again and to have the privilege of introducing him to the other children. Sophie went above and beyond her usual demands to be picked up and didn’t waste a second climbing the still shocked man, clinging to the front of his shirt until he put an arm out to hold her.

Jesper wasn’t in quite the same hurry that they were, happy to hang back and watch as the kids all bombarded Klaus with thanks and questions. Biting his lip to keep from laughing at the look of utter shock on the man’s face.

Not that he found it funny, exactly. Well, maybe a little funny. Actually, Jesper wasn’t entirely sure what he was feeling. But it made it almost impossible for him not to laugh at the sight of the kids all over Klaus. Impossible not to smile.

Agnes still stood by Jesper, practically hiding behind his legs, staring at Klaus with wide frightened eyes. Jesper knelt down to talk to her but she immediately latched onto him, wrapping her little arms around his neck and clutching his coat with tight fists.

Jesper sighed, standing up with the girl still in his arms. “Ok, I guess this is what we’re doing today.”

He walked up to Klaus, Agnes clinging to him like her life depended on it. The first wave of chaos had died down after Joelle had gotten permission to show the other children the stock of toys.

They’d quickly run off, Sophie having led the way as soon as her feet touched the ground.

Nelly had stayed behind though, waiting her own turn to talk.

She took one more step towards the large man. Looking up at him with her lips pressed together tight, her back straight, shoulders back, and hands clasped together behind her.

“Hello sir.” She said, clear but maybe not as confident as she was trying to appear. “I’m Nelly and I wanted to thank you for the music box. I like it very much.”

“Well, that was surprisingly civil of you.” Jesper said as he walked up behind her.

Nelly’s whole expression changed in the blink of an eye as she shot him a glare over her shoulder.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” He said. “Am I ruining your good first impression?”

Klaus was already far more collected than a few moments ago when the other kids had been all over him. Now he gave Jesper a brief, wry look before focusing his attention back on Nelly.

“Well it’s very nice to finally meet you, Nelly.” He said to her. “And I’m very glad to hear you liked the music box. It’s not the fanciest thing I’ve ever made, but I’ve always had some fondness for it. It’s a clever little thing. A clever little toy for a clever little girl.”

Jesper made no effort to hide how hard he rolled his eyes at that.

But he did feel maybe not the best about it when he noticed how Nelly was blushing at the small compliment. Her eyes on the ground as she tried to clumsily hide a shy smile with an awkward hand at her mouth.

“Oh, and who’s this?” Klaus asked, noticing that Jesper had yet another child still clinging to him.

“Hey, Agnes? Wasn’t there something you wanted to tell Mr. Klaus?” Jesper asked, trying to crane his neck back to look her in the eye.

Agnes only clutched onto him tighter, shaking like a leaf as she buried her face in his neck. Jesper couldn’t help the fond, sympathetic smile that took over his face as he held her tight, leaning his cheek against her head.

“I promise,” He said to Klaus. “She was just as excited to see you as the rest of them.”

“No, it’s alright. She’s fine.” Klaus said. “I understand. It can be scary meeting new people.”

Jesper wasn’t sure how long he stood there, watching Klaus looking at her with his own soft sympathetic smile, but when Klaus looked up and met his eyes Jesper felt himself give a little start. Like he’d been caught.

Suddenly Agnes in his arms and the bag of letters across his shoulder both felt very heavy and he had a renewed sense of urgency to get to work.

“Uh, Nelly.” He said quickly, breaking eye contact with Klaus to look at her. “Could you take Agnes to see the toys?”

Nelly gave him a look that clearly asked who he thought he was, expecting her to do what he asked. But she gently took Agnes by the hand when Jesper knelt down, getting her to reluctantly loosen her death grip on him so they could join the other kids. The two girls walked slowly, taking a wide path around Klaus.

“Sorry I didn’t warn you about the swarm.” Jesper said, shifting the bag of letters absently as he stood back up. “They insisted on thanking you in person and my ‘no’ doesn’t usually mean much to them.”

“Oh, no. It’s no problem. They’re all more than welcome to tag along with you.” Klaus paused. “This _is_ all of them, right?”

Jesper laughed. “Yep! That’s all of ‘em. At least, all the ones I’ve counted so far.”

His laughter died down when he noticed Klaus looking at him with genuine concern.

“Oh my god, Klaus. I’m kidding!” He said. “I know exactly how many of them there are. Considering everything they’ve put me through, I’m pretty sure I’ve got their faces permanently burned into my mind.”

Jesper cringed when they walked into the barn. The kids hadn’t wasted any time getting into the shelves of toys and, while it was a bit of a mess before, they had quickly made the place into a small disaster area.

Some had latched onto a specific toy right away, while others apparently felt the need to touch everything as they went. Not always gently. And there seemed to be some kind of complex game developing with dozens and dozens of mix-matched toys scattered all over the floor.

“I’m so sorry.” Jesper whispered through his teeth. “I can try to send them outside before it gets any worse.”

“No, no. It’s fine. They’re fine.” Klaus reassured him again with a smile. Though, not one of his most natural looking ones.

Jesper did his best to ignore them as they got to work, but there were times when things got loud enough or a fight threatened to break out when he found himself yelling over it all despite himself.

“Are they usually this,” Klaus paused, searching for a word as he watched the children play. “Loud?”

“Oh yeah. This is every day for me.” Jesper told him. “Just, _noise._ ”

But when he looked back at Klaus the man didn’t seem upset in the least. In fact, he was smiling.

And even if they were a headache, the kids were being surprisingly helpful. More than happy to hand over a specific toy when it was asked for and before he knew it the night’s preparations were finished.

“Ok, everybody load up!” Jesper called to the kids. “We’re headed out.”

There was a chorus of whining and groaning.

“Do we have to?” Oskar asked, dramatically collapsing to the floor.

Jesper stared down at him, unimpressed. “Well I’m leaving, so yes.”

“It’s alright if they stay here while we’re gone.” Klaus said behind him.

“What? Alone?” Jesper asked him incredulously.

“You don’t think they can handle a few hours on their own? From what you’ve told me they sound pretty independent.”

“It’s not them I’m worried about. It’s all this.” Jesper said, gesturing at the mess of toys all around them.

“What are they going to do that they haven’t already done?” Klaus asked.

“I don’t want to know the answer to that question.” Jesper told him. He sighed, running a hand through his hair. “I mean, I guess if you’re ok with it-”

Jesper was cut off by a chorus of simultaneous happy screams that had his ears ringing.

Klaus smiled at them before taking the last of the toys outside.

Jesper looked around at all the kids and took a deep breath. “Don’t mess this up for me. Don’t break anything and don’t break each other.”

“We’ll be fine.” Nelly told him, nose scrunched up in annoyance before she turned her back on him to focus on the other kids.

-

If Jesper was moving quicker than usual that night, Klaus didn’t say anything about it. Although, Jesper could definitely feel it in his aching back and legs by the time they headed back.

The first thing he noticed when they pulled up was the door to the barn hanging wide open, dim light flooding out onto the snow.

The second thing he noticed was the sound of kids shouting and bickering. He looked towards the noise and saw them all huddled around the base of a tall, old tree in the distance.

“You take care of the beasts.” He said to Klaus, even as he walked towards the kids. “I’m gonna go see what this is all about.”

As he approached Jesper saw that all the kids were looking straight up into the branches of the tree, even as they continued to talk to each other. But they all startled and turned to look at him when he spoke.

“What’s going on here?” He asked.

“Nelly’s trying to get Chekhov down.” Joelle said, pointing up and nervously chewing on the end of a braid.

“What?”

Jesper was confused. He wouldn’t necessarily call Nelly clumsy, but she definitely wasn’t the most physical of the children. Not unless she had to be. She was capable, but usually if anything involved climbing she was quick to defer to someone else. Usually Yvette, who seemed to have a healthy mix of monkey toes and the belief that she was invincible.

“He went up too high and won’t come back down.” Joelle continued tearfully. “He was screaming and crying like I’d never heard from him before.”

“No.” Jesper said, trying to scrounge up some small semblance of patience as he rubbed his aching head. “I meant why _Nelly._ Why is Nelly the one up there?”

“Mind your own business Jesper!” Nelly’s voice came from high above their heads. “I’ve almost got him.”

Jesper looked up and saw her, high above the forest floor balanced on a narrow branch while trying to reach the tense looking cat and still keep a steadying hand against the trunk of the tree.

“You don’t need to do this!” He yelled up at her.

“Yes I do! Joelle really likes this cat,” She yelled back. “And this one actually likes her!”

“No, I mean you don’t need to do _this!_ ” He continued yelling, trying his best not to sound desperate. “We’ll find some other way to get him down! It’s not safe up there!”

Even from way up there he could see the ugly way she scowled at him.

“Leave me alone! I can do this!”

“I’m sure you _can_ do it!” Jesper yelled again, his throat already feeling tight and hoarse. “But that doesn’t mean you _should!_ Get down right now and let someone else get him!”

“I didn’t need your help before and I don’t need it now!” Nelly yelled over the wind.

It happened in a split second. She reached for the cat, her foot shifted sideways, she gasped, and suddenly she was on the ground. Flat on her back, eyes closed.

Jesper felt his knees hit the ground. Couldn’t seem to remember how to breathe.

Everything was deathly silent, until Agnes started crying.

“Why are _you_ crying? You’re not the one who got hurt!” Yvette snapped at her.

“Not now. _Please._ ” Jesper said through gritted teeth.

Nelly groaned and tried to sit up. At least she was conscious. That was a good sign, right?

Jesper was honestly stunned. What was he supposed to do? He didn’t know how to handle an injured kid. Hell, he didn’t even really know how to _be_ an injured kid. Sure, he’d had plenty of clumsy moments when he was young, but he’d basically acted like he was made of glass from a very young age. Always avoiding anything that seemed even slightly uncomfortable or dangerous.

All he had was a vague memory of laying under an open window with his head throbbing, his mother and father talking to him softly while someone ran for the doctor.

“Get Klaus. Go get Klaus.” He said gesturing somewhere behind him, never taking his eyes off Nelly.

Yvette and Oskar immediately ran off towards the stable as Agnes continued to quietly sob.

Nelly looked around herself in a daze before groaning again and laying her head back down on the forest floor. A strong, troubled crease on her forehead as she shut her eyes tight.

Time ceased to be real as Jesper’s entire world narrowed down to watching Nelly lying on the forest floor until suddenly Klaus was there, kneeling down next to her and speaking softly. Suddenly Jesper could breathe again.

He wasn’t sure what Klaus was saying to her, but he sounded confident.

When Klaus picked her up she was silent but her whole face was scrunched up tight and her fists were clenched even tighter.

Jesper followed behind them on unsteady feet, faintly hearing the other children as they circled around Klaus and Nelly asking a million questions all at once.

Once inside Klaus sat her down on one of the tables, making sure she was able to sit up on her own before he turned his attention to her leg.

There was a thin branch, barely even a branch, a large twig thrust cleanly through her calf. A few inches of thin wood sticking out of both sides.

Jesper was extremely thankful that Klaus seemed very in control of this situation, because he wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep looking at _that._

The other kids didn’t seem to have that problem. They were all gathered around the two of them with a healthy amount of both concern and morbid fascination, and were happy to run and do whatever small task Klaus asked of them.

Jesper took a seat, moving himself a good few feet away while still being able to catch quick glances of Klaus carefully removing the branch then quickly cleaning and wrapping the wound, checking in with Nelly every step of the way.

Her only real response through the whole thing was a determined nod or two and a tight, scrunched up grimace when the branch was pulled out.

“And I think that’ll do it.” Klaus said, gently tying off the ends of Nelly’s makeshift bandage. “I bet a little rest sounds good after all that. How about we get you somewhere more comfortable than this table?”

She nodded again as she wiped one stray tear off her cheek.

Klaus carefully picked her up and set her down in the big chair by the fire.

The rest of the kids swarmed her as soon as she was down again, but Klaus somehow managed to convince them to let her rest. There was some loud whispering and fussing at each other, but they were all asleep pretty much as soon as they’d stopped moving.

Jesper couldn’t even be bothered to care that Klaus made all that look way too easy. He was just thankful for the peace and quiet.

God, he was exhausted. He’d really thought he’d hit rock bottom on that, but apparently there were still many new and fascinating levels of exhaustion to be explored.

How was it possible to be simultaneously so worried _for_ but so angry _at_ the same person?

Was this normal with kids? Did he ever make his parents feel this way? Did he make his father feel like this?

Jesper rubbed his tired eyes roughly with the heels of his hands.

When he looked up again Klaus was taking a seat next to him, looking just as tired as he felt.

He sighed and ran a hand through his beard.

“I think she’s pretty lucky, all things considered.” He said. “No head injury, no broken bones. The stick went straight through the muscle though, she should really stay off that leg for awhile. Not nearly as long as she would’ve if it was broken though. She seems tough, I’m sure she’ll bounce back before you know it.”

Jesper processed all that quietly, turning his head to look at the back of the chair by the fireplace.

“How did you get so good with kids?” He asked as he watched the kids sleeping. “Big family?”

He was still looking back over his shoulder so he missed the way Klaus tensed up at the question.

“Lots of brothers and sisters?” He continued as he turned around.

Klaus let out a small surprised laugh as the tension melted from his shoulders.

“Oh no, no brothers and sisters.” He answered, a nostalgic smile taking over his face. “Lots of little cousins though.”

“Really?” Jesper asked, surprised at both the openness and the answer. It was odd to think of Klaus with family. The man seemed almost like he’d just wandered out of the woods one day, fully formed. Like a fairy tale.

“Oh yeah. I was the oldest kid in my family by a few years so I ended up looking after them pretty often. All my aunts were always very happy to see me.”

“I bet they were.” Jesper laughed, surprised at how charmed he was by just that little bit of personal information.

“That was a long time ago,” Klaus said, wistfully. “But I guess there’s some things you never forget how to do.”

“Oh, well you’re still much better with kids than I am.” Jesper told him. “Even when I was a kid I didn’t really get along with other kids.”

Klaus looked at him for a moment and then gave him a tired, silent nod.

“You could at least pretend to be surprised!” Jesper said, loud enough that they both held their breath while they watched Agnes shift in her sleep on the other side of the room.

“No, I’m sorry. Really.” Klaus said, after they’d both breathed a sigh of relief. “But I’m sure you had at least a few friends.”

“Ok, let me tell you a story.” Jesper told him. “One summer, when I was about eight, there were a bunch of kids playing on the property right next to ours. A couple of families all vacationing in the same house together. And there weren’t a lot of other kids around normally, so of course I asked if I could go play with them.”

“Did your parents tell you no?” Klaus asked.

“Nope. Honestly, they seemed thrilled that I actually wanted to get out of the house. I even remember my Mom saying how much they’d all love me. Because who wouldn’t love her 'perfect little boy'?” Jesper told him, with the shadow of an embarrassed wince on his face.

“But they didn’t?” Klaus asked uncertainly.

“I mean,” Jesper continued, making vague motions with his hands. “I don’t think they had a problem with me, necessarily. The thing was, they all had bicycles. Brand new bikes. And they were all about those bikes, didn’t want to play anything that didn’t involve riding their bikes. Which made it kind of hard to include me, who didn’t have a bike. So of course I went home that day and asked my Dad to get me one.”

“Let me guess; your dad didn’t get you the bike?” Klaus asked with a knowing smile.

“What? Oh no.” Jesper laughed. “I had that bike within a week. But what I didn’t account for was how long it would take me to learn how to ride it. I spent all summer just trying to stay on that thing and by the time I had it down the other kids had gone back home.”

Jesper held up a hand before Klaus could say anything this time.

“That’s not the end of the story.” He said. “They came back the next year and I rushed out with my bicycle all excited. But the thing is, I hadn’t ridden it once since that last summer. And let me tell you, whoever said that thing about getting back on a bicycle being easy was a liar. I was on that contraption less than a minute before I veered off into a steep ditch right in front of all of them and then ran home crying. I was so mortified, I left the bike in the ditch and never talked to those kids again.”

“Oh.” Was all Klaus said.

“Yeah, so. Wasn’t great at getting time in with other kids. Oh! And do you know what they expected me to do at the postal academy?” Jesper asked, worked up now and maybe a little eager to change the subject. “Ride a horse!”

Klaus had to choke back a surprised laugh, afraid to wake the children up.

“You don’t know how to ride a horse either?” He managed to ask.

“Oh no.” Jesper scoffed. “No no no. The first time someone tried to get me on a horse I took one look at that thing and was like ‘Oh, a 2,000 pound bike that can get mad at me? No thank you.’ So no, not great at riding a horse either.”

“That explains a few things.” Klaus said with a grin.

“Excuse me? What’s that supposed to mean?” Jesper asked, fighting hard to sound offended and not just smile right back. The big guy’s smiles were becoming less and less rare, but the effect they had on him sure wasn’t getting any weaker.

“Well, you’re not exactly the most graceful person I’ve ever met.” Klaus answered, a twinkle of mischief in his eye.

“Ok, y’know what? You can start climbing down those chimneys yourself if I’m really so lacking in grace.” Jesper said. “I’m sure you’ll somehow manage to be great at it, just like everything else.”

“Everything else?”

“Yeah, everything else. Making toys, taming reindeer, patching up stubborn little girls. Nothing too hard for Mr. Perfect.”

Klaus considered him quietly for a moment. “Was that supposed to be an insult?”

“No.” Jesper said tiredly, slumping in his chair. “Just a very disgruntled compliment.”

“Ah.” Was all Klaus said to that.

Jesper stared at the ceiling, quietly fighting sleep as the silence between them grew again.

“I should go.” He finally said. “Not sure what’ll happen if I’m not at the post office first thing in the morning but I’m sure it won’t be good.”

Jesper pushed himself up from the chair and turned to look at the kids.

“I hate to wake them up.” He muttered. “Getting them loaded in the cart, then back out, and then trying to convince them to go back to sleep is gonna be such a pain.”

“They could stay here.” Klaus said, so softly that Jesper wasn’t sure he’d heard him right.

“Are you sure?” He asked, looking at Klaus in disbelief.

“Of course.” Klaus said, with slightly forced sounding confidence. “It’s probably best for Nelly if she doesn’t move that leg too much anyways, and you could probably use a break after a night like this. More room for them to run around, plenty of toys to play with. I’m sure there won’t be any complaining in the morning.”

“Ok,” Jesper said, gathering up his hat and bag unnecessarily slowly. “But just so we’re clear; you volunteered for this. Which means I can’t be held liable for anything they destroy.”

“Jesper, we’ll be fine.” Klaus insisted as they stood in the open doorway. “You’re leaving them with Mr. Perfect, remember?”

Jesper swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. “Thank you.” He managed to say as he walked out into the snow. “I’ll see you tomorrow, or well, more like tonight at this point.”

“See you soon, Jesper.” Klaus said before closing the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is actually only the first half of what I had planned for this chapter. I split it into two once I realized it was becoming MONSTROUSLY long. But that also means the next chapter is already more than half finished!
> 
> Jesper's bike story may not be the best example of what I imagine his problems with other kids were like, but it's one of those things I've been thinking about for so long that I couldn't not include it. And I wasn't going to pass up the opportunity to finally refer to a horse as "a 2,000 pound bike that can get mad at me".
> 
> And I also wanted to say I really appreciate everyone who's still keeping up with this story (and everyone who's found it in the last few months), it really means a lot to me that you like reading all the silly things I write!


	9. When Jesper's Away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The kids spend a day with Klaus and emotions are running high.

There actually wasn’t any complaining the next morning. There was, however, quite a bit of panicking.

Klaus had done his best to sound confident in front of Jesper, but despite how quiet the house was after the postman left his nerves were wound tight. He couldn’t imagine sleeping. Didn’t even try.

He sat back down, watching the children occasionally toss and turn in the mess of blankets he’d scrounged up for them, and tried to imagine what this next day was about to look like. Tried to remember what it was like to keep a gaggle of rowdy kids safe and fed and entertained. Tried not to dwell on how far back he had to reach for those particular memories, memories of his own childhood.

He managed to doze off as he leaned his head against his hand, elbow resting on the table, until Joelle cautiously roused him from his shallow nap with a soft poke on the knee.

“Where’s Jesper?” She asked, voice still groggy and sleepy.

“He went back to the post office.” Klaus told her, keeping his voice just above a whisper.

Joelle’s face fell instantly. A quiet “Oh.” was all she said.

She wandered away without another word to where the other kids were still asleep on the floor and shook Yvette’s shoulder until the other girl rolled over and gave her an annoyed “What?”

“Jesper left without us.” He heard Joelle say in a panicked whisper.

Oh. That wasn’t good.

Things went downhill very quickly from there.

Joelle was crying, Yvette was laughing, the boys were talking over each other, asking the same questions over and over again. Agnes had climbed into the chair with Nelly, who was sitting there sullen and silent, and Sophie had climbed up onto his back and was trying to get his attention by pulling on his ear.

“Now calm down.” Klaus said over all of them as he pulled Sophie off his shoulder to hold her properly. “Jesper will be back later tonight. He wouldn’t just leave you all.”

“He wouldn’t?” Joelle asked, looking up at him with hopeful teary eyes.

Klaus paused. He hadn’t known Jesper long, but he was sure his friend wouldn’t just run out on them. “I’m sure he wouldn’t.” He said confidently.

Joelle smiled, but that only seemed to marginally fix the larger issue as everyone still seemed tense. Muttering to each other, so much quieter than they had been just yesterday.

Maybe he needed to try something else.

“What do you want for breakfast?” He asked.

The kids all stared at him blankly. Except for Nelly, who didn’t look at him at all.

“Um,” One of the boys finally ventured to say. “Do you have eggs?”

“Yes.” Klaus said, not sure what to make of how cautiously that question had been asked. Maybe narrowing the options down would help. “How about eggs and toast and a little sausage? How does that sound?”

All the little eyes looking at him grew almost comically wide.

“That’s good. That sounds good.” Yvette said quickly, scrambling to get up from the floor.

The only real kitchen was back in the main house, so they all made the short trek through the snow. A little single file procession with Klaus in the lead and Nelly at the back, she’d refused his offer to carry her and was limping through the snow with Agnes giving her a shoulder to lean on.

Klaus wasn’t sure that was the best thing for her right now, in fact he was _quite_ sure it wasn’t, but he was hesitant to be firm with these kids. It didn’t feel like his place to say anything.

His kitchen table hadn’t seen this many people, well, ever. And it hadn’t hosted anyone other than himself in a very long time. The first thing he had to do was go hunt down a few extra chairs to crowd around it before he could even consider starting food.

The kids all sat around the table, watching him cook with rapt attention. They seemed warier this morning sitting in his kitchen than they had been last night. Whether that was because of the lack of Jesper or the lack of toys was hard to say.

The food had their full attention when it was set on the table, but no one immediately jumped up to take anything. All of them either staring cautiously at the plates of greasy eggs and sausage or at him until Klaus realized they might never eat anything until he served it _to_ them, very intentionally.

Once food hit plates the difference was night and day. All caution was thrown to the wind and the kids, even the most reserved of them, dug in with obvious enthusiasm.

Breakfast seemed to put the children in much better spirits, most of them getting louder and louder the emptier their plates got and then running out the door with barely a word to him as soon as they’d finished.

Nelly was still quiet, ignoring him almost completely to make her own way outside with some help from Oliver.

Klaus lingered behind, pulling out dishrags and heating water to wash up with almost automatically.

It’s what he would’ve done if they weren’t here, if he was spending the morning by himself, and there was something about having his nerves wound so tight that made keeping to a routine very appealing. He had to fight back the urge to pick up his ax and spend the rest of his morning out in the woods, mindlessly chopping wood, alone with his thoughts.

But that would be a waste, a waste of an opportunity to experience some small piece of the life he’d once dreamed of.

He wasn’t sure what he was so nervous about. If these kids were as independent as Jesper made them sound then he really shouldn’t have to do much. He should be able to just sit back and watch them play, enjoy just having them around until Jesper got back. 

But he felt like he was trying to prove something. Not to the kids and not to Jesper either, not really. He wanted to prove to himself that he could actually do this, that he was able to competently look after children. Even if it was only for a few hours. Prove that he at least had it in him to be a good father.

Klaus didn’t realize how much he’d retreated into his own thoughts until he heard the clinking of dishes behind him.

While most of the children had run outside as soon as their plates were empty, Agnes had lingered behind and was gathering up what remained of the plates and cups and silverware off the table. She must have sensed Klaus looking at her because she stopped for a moment and looked back at him, chewing on her lip nervously.

Klaus turned back to the sink after a few long seconds of quiet staring, Agnes seemingly frozen in place like a cautious deer watching him with wide eyes. 

The clinking noises continued as he resumed washing up and soon there was a little girl at his elbow, silently offering him a small stack of plates.

“Thank you.” He said, taking the dirty dishes from her.

“You’re welcome.” She said very, very quietly.

Agnes continued to clear the table, bringing him just a few dishes at a time until the table was clear and everything was clean and set to the side.

“Where does this go?” Agnes asked him, her voice louder and much steadier as she reached for a cup.

“It’s ok, we can leave them here. Let them finish drying.” He told her gently. Finishing this one simple chore with Agnes as his little helper had helped sooth his nerves tremendously. The desire to prove something was still there, but he felt better. Some small breakthrough had been made.

Agnes looked back and forth between Klaus and the mountain of freshly washed dishes before dropping off of her tiptoes and heading towards the door. Klaus was just behind her, curious to see what everyone else had gotten up to.

To his surprise, it didn’t seem like they’d gotten up to much. In fact, it almost seemed like they had been waiting for him. There was some lazy effort being put into what might have been the beginnings of a snowman, and it looked like Joelle’s cat had returned after last night’s drama, but they all looked up excitedly when he stepped out into the snow.

They must have spent all the awkward silence in between waking up this morning and getting breakfast coming up with questions to ask him, because that’s all they did. All at once. Questions about the toys, about his house, about everything. Including some surprisingly invasive ones.

“Hey, are you so big cuz you cut wood all the time? Or did you start cutting wood cuz being big makes it really easy?”

And if they weren’t asking questions they were trying to tell him about things he had absolutely zero context for, like their friends at school or something the chickens in the post office did (there were chickens in the post office?). All of their voices overlapping each other and making it impossible for him to focus on one thing anyone said long enough to give any real answers. He found himself just standing in the center of it all, completely overwhelmed.

“Hey, Mr. Klaus!” Yvette yelled over everyone else. “Hey! Hey! Look at this!”

“I’m looking.” He told her.

She smiled and grabbed onto the sides of Sophie’s face and pulled her cheeks tight. The little girl’s flat expression never changed but she silently stuck her tongue out as her face was pulled out of shape.

This immediately sent all the other children into fits of laughter, which only increased as Yvette repeated the little trick over and over again all while Sophie sat there, stoic and unfazed with her tongue sticking out until even Yvette was laughing so hard that she had to stop. Then Sophie had the smallest little smug smile on her face between her pinched red cheeks.

Klaus wasn’t entirely sure why it was that funny, but it was probably one of the cutest thing he’d ever seen and he was laughing too. Sophie’s smug smile growing as his hearty laugh almost drowned out all the kid’s high pitched giggling.

Everything seemed to be going well after that. For a minute at least. Then, while most of the kids were still catching their breath and Yvette was bugging Klaus about “That was funny, right? Wasn’t that funny?” Agnes started crying.

“Why are you crying now?” Oskar asked her.

“I just realized we’re missing school.” Agnes sobbed.

“No we’re not!” The boy told her. “It’s Sunday. Miss Alva doesn’t do school on Sundays.”

“Really?” She asked hopefully, looking up from rubbing at her tear streaked face. “Is it really Sunday?”

She was looking up at Klaus expectantly, and it was only then that he realized he hadn’t had a reason to keep track of the days of the week in a long time. Even with Jesper around. They never took a break from toy deliveries so the days still tended to blend together.

Thankfully, he didn’t actually have to answer her.

“Yesterday was Saturday and today is Sunday!” Yvette said loudly. “It’s not that complicated! There wasn’t any school yesterday and there isn’t any school today. Now quit cryin’!”

Well, that did get Agnes to stop crying, but Klaus wasn’t sure if he needed to do something about how _aggressively_ Yvette had handled that.

He frowned at her but she seemed too busy trying to organize any kind of game that would give her an opportunity to run to pay him much mind.

Klaus wasn’t going to push his luck though. After a rocky start all the kids were finally at ease and playing. Or at least most of them were.

Nelly sat alone on the steps watching everyone else play, her whole body tense and her arms wrapped tight around her.

He felt bad for her, there wasn’t much she could do on that leg just yet and she looked like she was ready to jump at the slightest sign of trouble.

He recognized that look on her face. Recognized it from the other side, when his mother or an aunt would pull him aside and gently tell him he didn’t have to worry about everything the little ones were doing anymore. The adults were back, relax, be a kid.

Klaus took a seat next to her. “Wouldn’t you like to go inside? Get some rest?”

“I’m resting just fine right here.” She told him, never looking away from the rest of the kids running and playing.

They sat together like that in silence, Nelly pulled in tight on herself and watching the other kids like a hawk, until something made her wince and her shoulders sag.

“Can you take me inside?” She asked, low and sullen.

Klaus was more than happy to pick her up and carry her back inside, setting her back down in the chair she’d spent the night in and checking the fire before he turned to leave.

“Is there anything else you need?” He asked, standing up from where he’d been kneeling by the fireplace.

“I’m fine.” Nelly said flatly, looking at the crackling fire instead of at him.

Klaus nodded silently, though he wasn’t sure she was paying him enough attention to notice. But as he stepped outside and went to pull the door shut behind him, well, then he had her attention.

“Leave the door open.” She said firmly.

“Are you sure?” Klaus asked her. “It’s going to stay a lot warmer in here if the door’s closed.”

“I want it open.” She insisted.

“Ok.” He said, not wanting to push her.

He pulled the door only halfway closed, leaving Nelly with a clear view outside from where she sat curled up in the big chair by the fire.

-

Nelly sat stiff in the chair, watching the half open door with a wary eye even though she heard nothing more suspicious than the sounds of a rowdy game of tag. 

She didn’t like being in here, away from everyone else in a strange place with a strange man. Even if sitting out in the cold did make her leg ache.

She couldn’t believe Jesper had actually left them here. What made him think he could get away with that? Mr. Klaus seemed confident he was coming back for them, but Nelly wasn’t so sure. If it weren’t for the ever increasing influx of letters asking for toys she wouldn’t be surprised if they never saw him again. Sure, he’d be coming back. But taking them back to the post office when he did would just be an unfortunate side effect for him, she was sure of that. A necessary evil.

Not that she could really blame him for ditching them at the first good opportunity he got. If _they_ could’ve found someplace to leave _him_ where he wouldn’t just come straight back to the post office she would’ve done it a long time ago.

The other kids might have warmed up to him but Jesper’s invasion of the one space in Smeerensburg where they were able to get away from, well, _Smeerensburg_ wasn’t something she would easily forgive him for. He’d come into their home, already feeling entitled to it, and refused to leave even though the place made him miserable.

But even worse than that, he’d started being _nice_ to them. Doing things for them that she had never been able to do on her own, like buying them fresh food and new clothes.

And he wasn’t even going to stay! What were they supposed to do once he was gone? Go back to the way things were?

The other kids would never be happy with their old lives now that they’d had this grown-up come in and start doing things for them. Never be able to tough out the cold and hunger the same way they did before. Content enough with their own company once the other kids in town inevitably came to their senses and started following their parent’s example again.

She resented him for that, that little bit of hope. It was cruelness all wrapped up in the pretty package of concern.

How had everyone else lost sight of the fact that he wasn’t there to fix their problems? He _was_ the problem! The problem they needed to fix on their own.

Nobody had helped them before Jesper showed up, and nobody would help them once he was gone.

And now there was this Klaus guy, just another dumb distraction everyone else was falling for, some lonely old man in the woods with a bajillion toys for some reason. All the kids in Smeerensburg seemed to think he was the best thing that ever happened to that miserable little town, and her own little group was following right behind them. But she wouldn’t be won over so easily, no matter how many toys he gave her or nice things he said. She didn’t like him and she wasn’t going to like him.

Or, more specifically, she wasn’t going to let herself like him.

She wasn’t going to be fooled by a few kind words and small gifts, not again.

She sat there alone, listening to the others laugh and yell on the other side of the open door with nothing to do but watch the crackling fire and stew over her own thoughts. Thoughts that had already been playing through her head in one form or another for weeks now.

Her anger and boredom fed into each other in a continuous loop of frustration until she resented even the simple comforts that had been provided for her.

She looked around the room, at the toys and tools scattered outside of her reach.

She didn’t have to stay in this chair just because some weird old man told her to.

Nelly determinedly pushed herself off the chair, both feet hitting the ground with her full weight behind them.

Pain shot up her leg like lightning and she gasped in shock before collapsing to the floor.

That was the final straw and she burst into tears, alone on the floor. Not just a few sneaky tears, but full unrestrained crying. Crying like she couldn’t remember letting herself do in years.

Not because she was hurt, but because she was _angry._ Angry at Jesper, angry at Klaus, angry at Smeerensburg and people she used to trust, but mostly angry with herself.

Despite the open door, no one seemed to hear her. At least, no one came to check on her if they did. She sat alone until Sophie wandered in. Whether she’d heard Nelly’s crying or just wanted to explore was impossible to say, but once inside she went right up to her.

Nelly had her hands over her face, rubbing at it and roughly wiping away tears. Sophie crawled into her lap and smacked at those hands until she moved them away.

“You’re not helping!” Nelly sobbed as Sophie continued to smack at the tears running down her cheeks.

After Nelly did nothing else in response, not even defending herself from the concerned assault, Sophie gave up and disappeared somewhere else in the room.

Nelly had just started working herself back up to a full cry again when Sophie reappeared, carrying a little wind-up rabbit in both her hands. She set the toy down in Nelly’s lap and patted her carelessly on the face, nearly hitting her in the eye, before going back outside.

She turned the little rabbit over and over in her hands, fascinated by the thing despite her determination to continue wallowing in her own misery and frustration.

The shiny turn-key on it’s back was impossible to miss, but she didn’t turn it. Preferring to run her fingers over the carefully hidden seams and joints until she found a panel that seemed to have some give to it. She pulled at it until the toy split open cleanly, revealing the mechanical workings inside. Just as delicate and precise as her music box was.

She carefully picked the thing to pieces, fascinated with how it all went together and barely thinking about what she was doing, until she heard heavy footsteps out on the porch.

She felt her heart drop into her stomach as she desperately tried to cover the toy rabbit’s exposed guts with her hands. For a brief, irrational moment terrified that a grandparent she hadn’t seen in almost six years was about to come through that door and see what she’d done.

Then Klaus walked in. Her shoulders slumped as she realized there was nothing she could do to fix things now and pulled her shaking hands away from the dismantled toy.

-

Jesper didn't know what he expected to walk in on when he made his way back to Klaus' cabin the next evening. The sounds of happy children playing? A chorus of unrestrained giggles mixed with a deep hearty 'ho-ho-ho'? A lecture on respecting other people's homes? Something on fire?

He definitely wasn't expecting the quiet.

As he gently opened the unlocked door the only sounds inside were the snapping and crackling of the fireplace and Klaus' voice, low and gentle.

He found most of the children asleep on the floor a short distance from the roaring fire piled together in what must have been every blanket and cushion in the small lonely home. It wasn't much, but they'd made the most of it and looked hopelessly entangled in their makeshift nest. Just a shapeless mass of cloth and little limbs and faces. 

And at the disused old workbench was Klaus; patiently explaining something to Nelly as she sat on his knee, attention fully given to whatever was in front of them. There was a look of pure wonder in her eyes and for once, Jesper thought, she actually looked like a child instead of a tiny angry adult.

On the workbench itself was a little wind-up rabbit, it's clockwork guts exposed and partially disassembled.

"Did you break that?"

Nelly's attention snapped to Jesper and she fixed him with the most acidic, venomous look any little girl could give. The one she usually looked at him with.

"No!" She said, firmly. "I took it apart."

"What's the difference?" He deadpanned back to her.

Jesper already had the wheels turning in his head ready to formulate an apology but Klaus just chuckled softly, a warm look on his face.

"No harm done, she just wanted to see how it worked. You've got a very clever little girl here, Jesper, and you can't blame her for getting restless stuck inside all day."

Before Jesper could respond Klaus was standing up taking Nelly along with him, careful of her injured leg.

"I suppose it's about time we got on our way." He said, gently depositing Nelly in his big chair. He gave her what looked like one of his old spare coats for a blanket, leaving the nest on the floor undisturbed. It was a well worn and patched old thing, but more than big and heavy enough to keep her warm.

"Uh yeah." Jesper found himself briefly speechless, though he wasn't sure why. "Yeah, let's get going. Toys don't deliver themselves. And you!" He said, turning back to Nelly in the chair. "You get some real rest, ok. Turn that big old brain off and go to sleep for once."

"Or what?" She asked with that look on her face that meant she thought she had the upper hand on him. "I'll end up on the naughty list?"

Klaus' brow wrinkled. "What's the naughty list?"

"Ok, time to go!" Jesper said, a little too frantically, pushing them both out the open door. "Lots of deliveries tonight! Can't waste a second!"

The last thing he saw as he closed the door was Nelly burrowing down into her makeshift blanket with the biggest, smuggest grin on her face.

-

They skipped the post office entirely at the end of the night and the sky was still deep dark and filled with stars when they arrived back at the cluster of cabins in the woods.

Jesper was relieved to see everyone exactly where they’d left them, still sleeping soundly by the fire that had died down to a low smolder.

Without even thinking about it he dropped down, sitting on the floor in front of Nelly in the chair and next to the tangled pile everyone else was in. Even so close to the fireplace the floorboards beneath him were cold and he took a poker to try and gently prod what was left of the dimly glowing logs into a full fire again.

He gave up after gaining very minimal success and set the poker back in place. As he leaned back, the pile of blankets and children shifted and Joelle rubbed one sleepy eye.

“Jesper?” She muttered.

“Yep, it’s me.” He whispered. “I’m back.”

She crawled across the floor and placed herself unceremoniously in his lap.

“I woke up and you were gone and I got so scared you weren’t gonna come back. Yvette laughed at me, but Mr. Klaus said you wouldn’t just leave us like that. And he was really nice to us while you were gone, he even made us lots of good food.”

Jesper looked at her with a tired smile as he listened. She soon drifted off back to sleep mid-sentence, still trying to tell him all about breakfast and the games they’d played and the birdhouses.

As he listened to the last of Joelle’s sleepy rambling fade he felt a small hand from behind him card through his hair.

“Jesper.” Nelly said, voice weak and sleepy. “Jesper, I’m sorry.”

“What?” There was no way he’d heard that right. “For what?”

Not that he couldn’t think of a good few dozen things he’d be happy to hear her apologize for.

“I’m sorry I don’t listen and I make things harder when you’re just trying to help.” She continued in a tired, teary whisper. Still absently running her fingers through his hair. “I’m sorry. I try so hard to protect everybody and make things better that I just make everything worse instead and I-”

“Hey, hey.” Jesper took her hand off his head and turned to look at her tired, red, tear stained face. She was going off the rails fast. Talking faster and louder, hyperventilating. Suddenly he was a lot less worried about getting that apology and a lot more worried about stopping Nelly from working herself up into a full panic. “That’s enough for tonight. Go back to sleep. You’re gonna feel a lot different about this when you’re not completely exhausted, trust me. Then you can tell me anything else you’re sorry for. I’m sure the list will have gotten a _lot_ shorter and you can go back to finding things to be mad at me for instead.”

She stared at him, eyes unfocused and tired, before she took her hand back and pulled Klaus’ coat tight around her. “Ok.” She said softly, before closing her eyes and seeming to drift back to sleep almost immediately.

Jesper sighed in relief as he leaned back against the arm of the chair. He had not been prepared for _that._

He closed his eyes, only for a moment, before he remembered he wasn’t alone here with the kids. He turned to see Klaus was still standing just inside the closed door, holding his coat in his arms.

“I know you already said it wasn’t any trouble,” Jesper said to him, smiling softly. “But thanks. Again.”

“Of course.” Klaus said quietly, looking at Jesper and the kids by the fire with an unreadable expression.

-

Klaus watched the little scene in front of the fireplace play out wordlessly, feeling like something had reached into his chest and squeezed hard.

He liked Jesper, he did. He was an odd guy but he was funny, full of so much energy and motivation. Clearly talking faster than he could think half the time but it was nice to have someone to talk to that didn’t expect much back after so long alone.

And his life had changed so much after Jesper had shown up. Maybe it didn’t look like much from the outside, but his entire outlook on life had changed. Changed for the better.

He liked Jesper, but he also felt something else.

Anger? Jealousy?

Something about seeing the postman with these kids, listening to his stories about living with them and caring for them and watching them play, and then hearing him say they hated him, that they were nothing but little monsters that made his life miserable made something in him ache.

He almost _wanted_ to be mad at Jesper. Mad at him for having this opportunity to be a father dropped in his lap and treating the whole situation with nothing but annoyance and contempt.

But there was something about seeing him like this, in front of the fire, smiling, surrounded by sleeping children, that made his chest ache in a different way.

A way that took his breath away and made him wonder how he could even survive being around his new friend when the man made him feel anything this strongly.

It was familiar and it hurt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Got this chapter done so quickly in part because I originally wanted it to be the end of the last chapter and in part because I'm working on developing better writing habits. Will the next chapter still take almost 2 months? I don't know!
> 
> Almost everything in this chapter that isn't Jesper's POV (so basically the whole day) were ideas that I had originally thought would be extras I might get around to writing later, but I'm very happy that I took the time to work them in here!
> 
> And this chapter includes the very first scene I wrote for this au! (The scene where Jesper returns) It was also the first piece of writing I ever shared publicly and you can still find it on my tumblr as one of the earliest Klaus Orphan au posts! So glad to finally give it more context!
> 
> Again, thank you to everyone for reading!
> 
> (Also, it was very hard to resist naming this chapter "Sophie does a Blep")


	10. Small Changes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The kids really aren't very patient about getting to see Klaus again.

It wasn’t long before the sun was starting to show itself through the trees and Jesper knew they’d have to head back for the day.

He was genuinely surprised when, upon being woken and told they were leaving, most of the kids only really complained about wanting to go back to sleep and not about wanting to stay with Klaus. Although, there were quite a few sleepy goodbyes that made them look much more well-mannered than Jesper had ever known them to be.

Klaus was very quiet through it all, even as he helped make sure everyone was loaded in and ready to go. Including Chekhov, who seemed to be trying to apologize to Nelly in his own way. Laying half across her lap when the little cat would usually only make an effort to snuggle up with Joelle.

Nelly just sat there quietly, absently stroking the cat’s ear every once and a while. There was no mention of anything she’d said last night but there had been a striking amount of quiet cooperation that made the morning much smoother. It was nice but the calm helpfulness was so strange, it had Jesper on edge.

He expected the kids would want to go straight back to bed once they got to the post office, but as soon as they saw all the other children already lined up at the door there was a sudden rush of excitement and everyone was suddenly wide awake. Sophie’s little friend even came running up to the moving cart fearlessly and Jesper had to act fast to grab Sophie and keep her from diving headlong at the ground to try and meet her. He set her down carefully and the little Saami girl spent a minute trying to talk to him again before the two girls went running off together.

Jesper quickly resigned himself to the fact that he’d be rolling the end of one day straight into the beginning of another as the Krum and Ellingboe kids, letters at the ready, started clamoring for his attention before he’d even walked through the door.

The rest of the kids dispersed quickly, either giving him a hand with the morning’s letters or going off to get their moment in the limelight telling all the other kids about how they’d spent a whole day with Klaus and seen all the toys.

Besides everyone having something new to talk about and Nelly putting more weight on her right foot than her left, there wasn’t much difference between this morning and any other. Which Jesper was grateful for as he went through the motions of collecting letters and postage almost automatically before distractedly waving the kids off to school.

Klaus asked about the kids when Jesper saw him again that night. He didn’t have a lot to tell him other than that they seemed fine, for what little of them he’d actually seen throughout the day.

He didn’t have much to update him on after just half a day, but he still scrounged up something to say about Nelly getting around on her own pretty easily and all the weird questions the Krum and Ellingboe kids had for them when they found out where they’d been.

Jesper didn’t mind talking about the kids. In fact, he’d love to know more about what their day with Klaus had been like.

But every time Klaus started talking about the kids on his own he’d suddenly cut himself off just as that soft smile started creeping over his face, looking almost embarrassed by something.

Aside from the odd back and forth of “want to talk about the kids, don’t want to talk about the kids” the night wasn’t any more or less eventful than any other. But as he left, Jesper yelled back “I’ll tell the little terrors you said hi!” and that managed to get one last smile out of Klaus for the night.

Which Jesper felt maybe a little too proud of himself for.

-

Not only were all the kids awake when he got back, they weren’t even upstairs.

In fact, he would’ve sworn they’d just been talking rather heatedly about something before he’d opened the door.

Jesper looked around at them in confusion, but before he could say anything Nelly started towards the stairs and suddenly everyone was acting like they were just about to go to bed anyways.

Usually he’d be annoyed at this much commotion after a long night, just wanting to lay down and get some rest without having to deal with them, but tonight he found he didn’t mind being reminded of their presence quite so much.

When he’d left the kids with Klaus Jesper had been looking forward to sleeping alone, but once he’d actually laid down the cold and quiet of the empty post office had been too strange. He’d pulled all the thin ragged scraps of blanket around himself and spent most of the night laying awake, wondering if the kids were managing to sleep through the night back with Klaus.

Nelly frowned, looking down at where all the blankets were still bunched up in one tangled mess, but she didn’t say anything.

Jesper let the kids pick what they wanted from the pile of blankets before taking his own. He laid down but it seemed like the kids still weren’t quite ready to settle.

Joelle was sitting by his head, telling him all about their time with Klaus, Oskar lay with his head on Jesper’s stomach and Oliver was close by, nearly tucked into Jesper’s side.

It wasn’t until Joelle had grown quiet and everyone seemed to be asleep that Jesper realized he was completely surrounded, kid’s on all sides. Had they actually missed him?

He lay awake, silently looking up at the worn and weathered boards of the ceiling and pointedly not at the just barely visible shapes of sleeping children around him, until he heard a muffled sniffle on his left side. Then another, and another.

He craned his neck to look at where the noise was coming from without disturbing the kids piled around, and on, him. He saw Oliver at his side, shaking faintly in the dark.

“Hey bud.” He whispered. “What’s the matter?”

“I’m just hungry.” Oliver whispered back.

Oh.

“Well try to go back to sleep. That way it can be morning even faster. You’ll close your eyes and the next thing you know, boom, breakfast time.”

“Ok.” The boy whispered, but Jesper could feel silent tears soaking into the crook of his elbow as Oliver rolled over and pretended to sleep.

Jesper resumed staring up at the ceiling. A tight, uncomfortable feeling forming in his own stomach.

The issue of food hadn’t become any easier, despite the odd sort of success the post office was seeing. Even if he was making a little bit of money now they’d all lost something else key to how they used to make ends meet. Time.

Everything had become so busy so fast. Alva’s supply of discounted fish had run out, the kids spent too much time at school or playing with their new friends to go scrounging for bread, and even the chickens had stopped laying as much now that their coop had become a somewhat functional post office.

All of that added up to them somehow having even less to eat than before. He just couldn’t afford it. And no one had the time or the energy to cook.

He hated the thought of it, but he was almost upset that Klaus had been kind enough to make sure they were fed. Now they had something better to compare their normal meals to. At least, Jesper assumed it was better. It’s not like it could get much worse than what they usually had.

-

Things weren’t back to “normal” for long before the kids started getting restless.

After a few days of overhearing some of the kids bragging about their newfound “expertise” on Klaus to their friends Jesper started to notice their tone changing to something more sad. Although the louder ones still took every opportunity they had to talk about their time with the toy-maker, they’d lost some of that initial enthusiasm.

One day, in that small window of time between collecting letters in the morning and the kids leaving for school, Jesper got an earful about what their problem was as he was sorting mail.

“When are we going back?” Oskar whined.

“I don’t know.” Jesper shrugged dismissively.

“Well you _could_ know!” Oskar insisted. “Cus you’re the one who decides to take us or not!”

Jesper looked at the boy with tired, narrowed eyes.

“Am I?” He asked. “Because it sure doesn’t feel like I’ve been making a lot of decisions lately.”

Oskar frowned, looking briefly confused and maybe even a little hurt, before rallying himself together.

“But when are we going back?”

Jesper groaned.

“Aren’t you worried about missing school? And what about your friends?” He tried, hoping he’d hit on something that would be interesting enough to keep these kids from making themselves a regular fixture in the last bit of his business they hadn’t taken over yet.

“They’ll still be here when we come back.” Oskar continued, stubbornly optimistic.

Jesper stared down at the boy. “I’m not making any promises.” He said flatly.

-

But, promises or no promises, it wasn’t long before Jesper found himself pulling up to Klaus’ home in the middle of the week, once again with a full load of eager kids.

This time there was no look of shock or confusion on Klaus’ face when the kids jumped out into the snow, just pleasant surprise.

The reindeer he’d been leading back to the stable might have been a little shocked though.

At the sight of the large animal most of the kids stopped dead in their tracks, some of them taking a few steps back towards Jesper, but not Joelle.

Joelle just ran faster.

Jesper was shocked she didn’t startle the poor beast, and by the look on Klaus’ face so was he.

He put one hand out, gesturing for Joelle to stop, while keeping the other on the reindeer’s side.

Joelle was breathless but smiling ear to ear. She was trying to say something, but she just couldn’t seem to get the words to come out right in her excitement.

“Would you like to pet her?” Klaus asked after watching the girl stutter and sputter helplessly.

_“Yes!”_ Joelle finally managed to get out.

Klaus picked her up so she was sitting on one arm while the other was in front of her, keeping her from falling, and lifted her right up to the reindeer’s snout. Joelle gasped in awe and giggled as she reached out to gently pet the large animal between the eyes.

The other kids started sneaking up closer to Klaus, all now clamoring to get their own turn. Except Nelly, who had moved to stand by Jesper a fair distance away.

“When did that happen?” Nelly asked him, scooting closer to his side and further from the animal.

“What, the reindeer? I guess it’s been a few days now.” He told her. “You heard the kids talking about it at the post office, right?”

“No not that.” She frowned. “When did _that_ happen? Why did it happen?”

Nelly pointed down to where the cart had been reworked into a makeshift sleigh.

“Oh, that. We had a little incident the other night. I guess not everyone in town is equally thrilled with all the, y’know, joy and happiness and not murdering their neighbors in the streets that’s been going on.”

“You were attacked?” Nelly asked, looking at him with wide eyes and a furrowed brow.

“Well, I wouldn’t say that. Exactly. More like, uh-” Jesper paused, looking over what had once been his cart. “Yeah, actually, I guess we were attacked.”

Her frown deepened as she looked over the sleigh and muttered something under her breath that almost sounded like a question.

“What was that?” Jesper asked.

“Why didn’t you _tell_ us?” She repeated, huffing in annoyance.

Jesper paused, confused. “I didn’t think you’d care.”

Nelly looked away, grumbling to herself. Jesper was pretty sure she didn’t have much to say to that, because just a few days ago she probably wouldn’t have cared. At least, she wouldn’t have admitted to it.

“You need to stop being so dumb.” She said suddenly. “You really should’ve been prepared for somebody to come after you when things started to change. You can’t mess with tradition.”

"Let me tell you something about tradition." Jesper scoffed, glancing over at Klaus to make sure the other kids still had his attention. "On the one side of my family it's tradition to work hard, and on the other it's tradition to marry well. Both things I have spent most of my life trying to avoid. What I'm saying is; people make a big deal out of keeping up traditions but really you can end them whenever you feel like."

She gave him a long, considering look.

"That sounds like a gross oversimplification."

"Ok, to be fair, I may not have completely managed to shake off those expectations yet. But hey, change takes time!"

And maybe a little more effort than climbing out of windows to avoid suitors or avoiding his dad by hiding in an apartment on the other side of town.

Nelly stood by him quietly after that, a thoughtful frown on her face, as they watched the rest of the kids take their turns petting the reindeer before Klaus got her back in the stable with the others and everyone went inside.

Nelly sat by Klaus, watching everything he did with rapt curiosity and uncharacteristic shyness. It was strange to see her so clearly want something, even if Jesper wasn’t sure what that something _was,_ and not go after it with her usual forceful bluntness.

But for some reason as he watched the two of them, Klaus happily indulging the girl’s curiosity even while the other children were vying for his attention, Jesper couldn’t help thinking of the other night. When, in the middle of Jesper’s explanation of the strange changes going on in Smeerensburg, the bakes sales and book clubs and distinct lack of vindictive property destruction, Klaus had pulled out that line _“A true selfless act always sparks another”._

Jesper wasn’t sure he really believed that, but hey, it sounded pretty good. And it was becoming increasingly clear to him, in this town, with these kids, with Klaus, that maybe small changes could make big differences.

But of course, the peacefulness couldn’t last and they weren’t inside long before Jesper heard the telltale sounds of roughhousing and children making noises of both pain and annoyance that were almost indistinguishable from each other.

Agnes came running up to him, still looking back at where the other kids were doing... whatever it was they were doing.

“I don’t wanna play a hitting game!” Agnes complained.

“Then why were you playin’ with us at all!” Yvette asked, hands on her hips.

“It wasn’t a hitting game when I started!” Agnes whined, balling her fist up in the edge of Jesper’s coat.

“Ok, that’s it. Everybody outside. And no more-” Jesper waved his hands around helplessly. _“Hitting games.”_

There was a lot of noise about how they didn’t have to listen to him and how it wasn’t fair to make them all go outside, but when Nelly slid off her chair and walked wordlessly out the door the rest of the kids began trickling out after her.

All of them, until it was just Yvette left in the middle of the room scowling with her arms crossed stubbornly.

When she finally got bored of that she made a big show of getting real close to Jesper and stopping to glare at him on her way out.

She stuck her tongue out at him and Jesper stuck his tongue out right back.

She huffed and stomped off.

When Jesper turned back around he saw Klaus watching him with a smile on his face.

"What are you looking at?" Jesper asked him.

"Nothing." He said, looking away with that smile still stubbornly on his face.

"Well you better keep on looking at nothing." Jesper told him.

"Happily." Klaus said as he got back to work.

And, oh. One simple word shouldn't have that kind of power, but Jesper's stomach seemed to flip in some not entirely unpleasant way and for a moment it seemed like all he could do was look at that man's smile.

But there was work to do and now that the kids were out of the way maybe it wouldn’t take them all night to get things ready.

More letters and more toys meant more work, but somehow it didn’t feel like things were getting any harder. In fact, it almost seemed like it was getting easier. Unfortunately, getting easier didn’t seem to be making it go any faster.

They’d developed something of a routine very early on, but it wasn’t one that seemed to be adapting well to the increased workload.

They both worked through the piles of carefully sorted letters together. Klaus picking out toys with an equal amount of ease and determination while Jesper lagged behind, frequently unsure of what he was doing even though they’d been at this for weeks.

(And he may or may not have only started doing it as an attempt to make himself look busy.)

But while Klaus may have been faster at picking out toys he was, well, he was also making a mess of things.

Jesper found himself growing more and more frustrated as he watched the pile of opened letters and discarded envelopes grow and grow right alongside the stacks of packages labeled with nothing more than a child’s name.

He’d gone through most of his life with other people around to do the organizing for him, but that didn’t change the fact that Jesper _liked_ things being organized. Maybe even enough to actually do something about it himself for once.

When they’d first started, just having names on the packages had been plenty for him. He was just happy that this crazy scheme was even working, but as they went on it got harder and harder to keep track of where every single toy needed to go. Jesper had started emphasizing to the kids that they needed to have a return address on their letters if they wanted the toys to go to the right houses. They’d caught onto that quick, and now Jesper had a handy way to keep track of all of the night’s deliveries. As long as those envelopes stayed with the right toys.

He’d hoped Klaus, ever competent and attentive Klaus, would have noticed on his own that the toys Jesper picked had an addressed envelope tucked into the simple brown paper they wrapped them in. But no, so far he hadn’t.

Jesper looked at the quickly growing pile of unaddressed packages and sighed.

“Hey, Klaus?” He called as he crossed the room. “Could you maybe not just toss a letter wherever you feel like after you’ve read it?”

Klaus frowned.

“Like, I get it.” Jesper continued, picking loose letters and envelopes up off the floor. “They’re not official packages, they don’t really need the full address on there and it would be kind of weird to start putting it there now. But could you please try and keep the letters with the toys? So I don’t have to try and remember where every kid in town lives off the top of my head? Maybe you can do that, but I sure can’t!”

Klaus looked taken aback, but not mad.

“Oh, sure. If that makes things easier for you, I guess I could do that.” He answered quickly, if not a little uncertainly. “Do you want help, uh, fixing what’s already done?”

“Nope.” Jesper said, eyes already scanning Klaus’ finished work for matching names. “I’ve got this.”

Once he’d finished matching up the letters and packages Klaus had already completed Jesper went back to work, grabbing a new letter and trying to make sense of the messy scribbles and earnest attempts at spelling from someone clearly still learning their letters.

He turned to look at Klaus after what felt like only a few minutes and saw that the man had already picked and wrapped about a dozen more toys.

Only two of which actually had a letter attached to them.

“Klaus!”

“What?” Klaus asked, turning to look at Jesper who was pointing at the pile of paper beside him with his eyebrows raised.

“Oh.”

“It’s. Not. That. Hard.” Jesper told him. “I mean, if I can do it- You know what? Just let me do it.”

Klaus opened and closed his mouth helplessly for a moment as he watched Jesper get to work re-sorting the opened letters and pairing them with their matching packages with singular focus.

So focused in fact, that he didn’t notice how easily Klaus was distracted from his own work every time he set another finished package on Jesper’s side of the room or glanced over his shoulder to see the postman frowning in concentration as he fussed with the organization of piles he’d already finished with, movements getting more precise and intentional as he found a rhythm to his work.

“Here,” Jesper said, pushing a small stack of unopened letters into his hands. “These are all on the same block. If you do them all at once it’ll be easier for me to keep them together.”

“Makes sense.” Klaus said, eyes following Jesper as he immediately turned and walked back to his improvised sorting station.

Now it was Jesper who was working faster, as Klaus found himself frequently pausing just to watch the postman lose himself in his work. But still, it felt like no time at all before the last letter was opened, the last toy was picked, and the last package was wrapped and carefully labeled and sorted.

“There. All done.” Jesper said, gesturing to all the neatly organized packages with their identifying letters tucked under strings and ribbons and folds of paper. “Beautiful!”

Klaus hummed in agreement, looking at Jesper’s proud face as the postman surveyed his work.

“Ok, let’s load up!” Jesper said. He could feel that good old familiar exhaustion under his sudden enthusiasm, but he was buzzing with a strange kind of newfound energy that made him eager to keep things rolling.

“It’s still early.” Klaus told him.

Jesper looked out the window where the sun was still shining, reflecting brightly off the snow.

“Oh.”

Well, they’d definitely figured out how to speed things up a little. Apparently. Somehow.

“I guess we could see what the kids are doing.”

When they stepped out onto the front porch it wasn’t hard to find the kids, they hadn’t wasted any time with exploring and had jumped right into one big game of pretend together.

They’d found an outcropping of stumps and rocks within sight of the front porch and had apparently decided they would make excellent sailing vessels for a game of Pirates versus Navy.

Which, like many of their other games, was essentially just a glorified snowball fight.

Yvette took the lead on one side with Oskar and Oliver following her every command and echoing her every jeer while Sophie sort of milled around the edge’s of their “ship” occasionally placing rocks or feathers that she’d found at their feet, which the boys would then excitedly exclaim was treasure.

Nelly was front and center on the other side, leaning heavily on her good leg with Agnes at her elbow awaiting orders while Joelle was just struggling to keep Chekhov up on the stump with them.

“Y’know you’ll never catch me and me crew if you insist on playin’ by the rules! Why don’t we stop all this pointless runnin’ in circles and talk this out?” Yvette yelled across the yard. “One captain to another.”

Nelly raised an eyebrow. “I’m an admiral, actually. But I’ll allow it.”

She paced the “deck” of her imaginary ship with her hands clasped behind her back, her expression carefully schooled and her chin held high.

“Oh my god.” Jesper said, hit by a sudden sense of familiarity. “She looks like my Dad. Why does she remind me of my Dad?”

Klaus raised an eyebrow. “Well maybe there’s something you’re not telling me.” He said with a wry smile. “Are you sure you haven’t been to Smeerensburg before?”

“Yeah, no.” Jesper said, quickly picking up on the implications and shaking his head. “Around the time she would’ve been born I was probably busy intentionally failing my first year of business school by pretending not to know how to do long division.”

Klaus’ brow wrinkled. “What made you want to fail?”

“Oh well, it’s kind of a long story.” Jesper said, immediately backpedaling on his brief moment of openness. “You know what? It’s not, actually. I didn’t want to go to business school. That’s the whole story.”

Klaus was giving him his full attention now, looking at him with a worrying mix of amusement and thoughtfulness. “Oh really? That’s all there is to it?”

“As far as you need to know, yes.”

“Alright.” Klaus said, taking his contemplative gaze off of Jesper to go back to watching the kids play. “So, business school?”

“Ugh.” How did people keep more than one secret at a time? This is why he stopped having conversations that lasted longer than twenty minutes at parties. “Yes, business school. One whole year of business school. There was also a semester of applied finances, a few months of art history, and about three weeks of horticultural studies. Anything else you wanna know?”

Klaus looked at him out of the corner of his eye. “Not right now.”

The truce talks out at sea did not seem to be going well. There had been some brief pleasantries but both Nelly and Yvette were trying to convince the other that they should come over to _their_ ship to talk. Neither was giving into the obvious attempt at setting up a trap and things were about to come to blows again.

Nelly made a snide comment about how easy it would be to arrest them now that they’d made themselves an easy target and Yvette fumed.

“Oh yeah! We’ll see how easy you think it is when- when-” She sputtered angrily until she locked eyes on Klaus. “When you come over here and realize we’ve got a sea monster bigger than yer whole boat!”

Jesper had to cover his mouth to try not to laugh, imagining Klaus trying to act like some big scary sea monster in a snowball fight.

And he knew Klaus would do it too. Unless there was some immediate danger involved the man seemed to have a very hard time telling these kids no.

That observation seemed to be holding true as Klaus, looking decidedly uncertain and uncomfortable, stepped out to join the kids. Yvette and the boys cheered triumphantly, and threw some not so kind words at their opponents, while Sophie practically leapt at him and made herself at home in his arms.

Klaus tried to set Sophie down with the others, but she just whined and refused to let her feet touch the rocks.

“Sophie’s not a pirate.” Oliver told him. “She’s a shark.”

“Ah.” Klaus said looking down at the girl. “Then you should probably stay down here in the water with me.”

“Well maybe we’ve got our own sea monster.” Nelly said, making pointed eye contact with Jesper.

“No you don’t.” Jesper yelled out into the yard, leaning against the wooden post with his arms crossed.

Jesper looked over to Klaus on the “pirate’s” side of the game, still heads taller than Yvette even with her standing on the pile of rocks that served as her ship. How was he supposed to be a match for that exactly?

But Klaus smiled at him, raising his eyebrows expectantly, and Jesper realized the only one who wasn’t waiting for him to join the game was himself.

He rolled his eyes but trudged over to join Admiral Nelly’s fleet.

But it wasn’t really Klaus that he needed to worry about. The two adults focused mainly on the kids and the kids, in turn, were throwing snowballs almost exclusively at the opposing “sea monsters”.

Unfortunately for Jesper, these kids had plenty of practice when it came to throwing things at him.

He could barely stoop down to make his own snowballs in between getting pelted square in the face and chest by Yvette and the boys.

After failing to return a good few dozen hits Jesper stomped right over to the rocky pirate ship and grabbed a confused and stunned Oskar under the arms and started carrying him back to the other side.

“What are you doin’!?” Yvette yelled at him.

“Whatever I can to reduce your numbers.” He told her, struggling to keep a hold of Oskar while Nelly laughed triumphantly behind him. “I’m a sea monster. Remember? I can go wherever I want.”

“Klaus!” Yvette cried, turning to their own sea monster. “Do somethin’!”

Klaus looked at Jesper, and Jesper looked back at Klaus. They both seemed to be wondering exactly what the something that Klaus would do was.

They weren’t given much time to think though as Sophie decided little sharks could also go wherever they wanted and rushed over to Jesper, trying to climb up his leg. With her weighing him down on one side, and Jesper’s sneaking suspicion that she could bite at any moment, he found himself losing his footing and falling as carefully as possible to his knees in the snow.

Sophie continued clinging to his back as Oliver jumped off the ship to rescue his brother before Klaus had time to do anything. The girls on the other side were yelling that he wasn’t allowed to do that and started aggressively targeting him with snowballs, which mostly just hit Jesper who was stuck on the ground between them.

There was so much going on. Klaus was moving to pick both the boys up but the girls redirected fire towards him and he was suddenly very dedicated to pretending that every hit they landed made him move slower and slower. The pirates only goal now seemed to be to get Oskar while keeping Jesper from standing up, as Yvette had also jumped down and joined Sophie and Oliver’s attempts to physically overwhelm him.

The kids were all over him, snowballs were still flying, and Klaus was absolutely no help to anyone. But Jesper couldn’t stop himself from laughing in the middle of it all as Sophie accidentally flipped herself over his shoulders and into the snow in front of him.

She seemed mad, but once the first chuckle had burst out of him he couldn’t stop laughing. Even when she pulled herself up and gave him an open palm smack right in the middle of his face. That seemed like a good opportunity to let the pirate’s have some small taste of victory. Jesper let go of Oskar and collapsed into a boneless heap in the snow, still shaking slightly with silent laughter. Yvette and the boys cheered, still on top of him and easy targets for the naval fleet who were yelling at them to get out of the “water”.

Jesper locked eyes with Klaus and for a moment they were smiling at each other, laughing and beaming from ear to ear, before Klaus suddenly looked away off into the treeline.

Jesper’s face felt hot as the laughter died down and he tried to catch his breath and extricate himself from the enemy forces that were still trying to dog-pile him.

The kids continued on with some new permutation of their game as Jesper stood up and walked over to Klaus.

“Did you find time to eat dinner before you left?” Klaus asked him, still looking off into the trees.

“Uh, no.” Jesper swallowed nervously, looking around, hoping the kids hadn’t heard that. He knew it wasn’t the best way to be dealing with their food problem, but he’d kind of hoped that in all the excitement they’d just forget how many (or how few) meals they’d had that day. Just wear themselves out enough that they’d go to sleep without any fuss and skip straight to breakfast again.

“I’m not surprised.” Klaus said, seeming oddly distracted. “You did get here pretty early today. Why don’t you get everyone inside and I’ll see what I can throw together real quick.”

When he told them they were stopping for dinner it was less Jesper taking the kids inside and more the kids taking Jesper inside as they lead the way over to the house he’d only ever peeked in the window of that first night he’d come looking for Klaus.

It seemed very similar to the other building in construction and was tidy but sparsely furnished. A lot of empty space that didn’t look completely intentional.

As they stepped inside Sophie grabbed at Jesper, demanding to be held while the other kids ran off in what he presumed to be the direction of the kitchen.

He looked down at her grubby little hands reaching up to him. They were usually pretty dirty but this looked like she’d dug straight through the snow and buried them in some mud. Jesper picked her up but her sense of victory was short-lived as he found a sink and a bar of soap and started trying to wash her hands.

Sophie whined at him wordlessly.

“Yeah, yeah. I get it.” He told her, rinsing her hands and carefully checking for any left over soap bubbles between each little finger. “I see what goes into your mouth most of the time, but if you’re going to eat with your fingers they might as well be clean. Just this once.”

Sophie growled at him as he finished and she could finally pull her hands free and demand to be set down.

“I’m not sure that was really worth all the effort.” Klaus said, watching the little girl climb up into an empty chair at the table.

“Well, it’s better than letting her eat dirt all day. Wait, is dirt actually good for kids?” Jesper asked. “We had a maid who told me that once. I just assumed she didn’t want to clean up after me.”

Klaus looked at him oddly for a second before a small, somewhat confused smile took over his face.

“That’s definitely something I heard growing up.” He looked at the kids fondly and shrugged. “Maybe there’s some truth to it.”

“Well, if there is,” Jesper said looking over all the scraped knees and stained clothes, the mud-smeared faces, hair filled with leaves and twigs and God knows what else, grubby little hands and dirty finger nails. “Then these have to be the healthiest children on Earth.”

Klaus laughed and Jesper smiled as he found an empty seat for himself between Joelle and Agnes.

He looked over the table. It wasn’t anything special, just good whole food, but after months of barely getting by on boiled eggs and moldy bread and fish (God, so much fish) it looked more appetizing to him than any four-course dinner party or expensive brunch ever had.

In the center was a large pot of dark stew, more than enough for the hungry swarm Klaus had invited into his home. Jesper was sure the meat had come from something that could be found out there in the woods but he wasn’t too concerned with that, what really caught his attention were the little bits of orange and white and green he could see floating around in the thick broth. Vegetables! When was the last time he’d had a vegetable?

There wasn’t much else. Although there didn’t really need to be, the stew looked like it was more than enough of a meal all on it’s own. But beside the pot on the table was a cutting board and a loaf of bread, good fresh bread, with a few slices already cut and a small dish of pale yellow butter to go with it.

Butter! Where did Klaus get butter? Who let this man have butter? Jesper hadn’t seen butter in months!

He stared, transfixed by the simple niceties in front of him. In that moment it was the best meal he’d ever seen. How was this fair? They were barely scraping by and Klaus could set a table like this?

Jesper was broken from his spiraling thoughts as his vision blurred and he felt moisture collecting in the corners of his eyes and realized he was on the verge of crying. Crying over butter and stew!

He caught Klaus’ eye and for a second was terrified that he could see straight through him, that he would say something.

But after a brief but lingering look of concern flashed across his face, he turned to the kids and started filling their bowls with hot stew.

After the kids had their food the usually quiet man seemed to find a million and one things to talk to them about. Checking on Nelly’s leg, asking about school and their friends and Joelle’s cat.

He caught Klaus looking at him from the corner of his eye again and realized what he was doing. He was distracting them. And Jesper was grateful for it. He couldn’t imagine much worse right now than letting these kids see him brought to tears by a dish of butter.

He relaxed ever so slightly and managed to hold himself together as they ate, but that feeling didn’t go away. Even with plenty of good hot food in him and Klaus doing his best to keep the kids distracted.

“I think I’ll go make sure everything’s ready to go.” He said once his bowl was empty, standing up from the table maybe a little too quickly.

The kids all looked at him strangely until Klaus said something about making sure there was no food left to spoil and they all eagerly offered up their empty bowls for seconds. All except Nelly who was studying Jesper’s face with a suspicious eye as he walked out the door.

The sun was only just starting to set as he made his way across the yard. There wasn’t anything left to “check on”, they’d done everything shy of loading things into the sleigh and all the carefully labeled and sorted packages were exactly where he’d left them.

He walked past them and collapsed into the chair by the fire. Almost immediately the floodgates opened and he sat there, staring at the dim fireplace and crying over butter and all the other small things he’d never thought he’d miss.

-

The tears had stopped and Jesper was still sitting there, watching the fire crackle and pop with his knees pulled up and his eyelids feeling heavy, when the door opened. The kids all rushed past him, running to the toys with only a few concerned glances thrown his way, Klaus was close behind them carrying a large steaming mug in each hand.

It smelled like coffee. God. Please let it be coffee.

“I told them they could play for a minute.” Klaus said, handing one of the mugs to Jesper. “I hope that’s alright.”

Huh? Why wouldn’t it be? What did his opinion have to do with it?

“No, yeah. They’re fine. Thanks.” Jesper said quietly, taking the warm mug. He’d done plenty of whining since he’d come to Smeerensburg but he was pretty sure this was the first time he’d actually let himself cry and he was also pretty sure it still showed on his face. He should probably be embarrassed, but he honestly felt nice now that it was over with. Felt almost peaceful.

“I know it must be hard for you,” Klaus said, pulling up his own seat. “Going from such a well-off and comfortable life to living in a place like Smeerensburg.”

Jesper nearly choked on the first sip of his coffee. “What? Who told you about that?”

“You did.” Klaus said. “The first night we met you told me your Dad has money. ‘Loads of it’ I believe were your exact words.”

“Oh, you remember that?” Jesper asked nervously. He had kind of hoped that Klaus wasn’t paying a lot of attention to the things he’d said that night, but now that he knew the man better he couldn’t say he was surprised that he actually seemed to remember more of what had come out of his mouth than Jesper did himself.

“Yeah, maybe not the best introduction. But it could’ve been worse.” He continued. “I could’ve chased down a man I’d just met and picked him up, physically,” Jesper made a show of counting on his fingers. “What was it? 2 times? 3?”

Klaus looked away from Jesper, turning his head just slightly. And, oh.

He was blushing. He’d made Klaus blush.

Jesper felt a smug smile creep onto his face, even as his heart was pounding in his chest.

“I think it’s fair to say first impressions aren’t really our strong suit.” He said, looking down into his coffee and away from Klaus and his rosy cheeks.

“No.” Klaus said with a self-deprecating chuckle. “No they are not.”

It grew quiet between them again as Jesper sipped his coffee, attention split between watching the fire and glancing over his shoulder at the kids, but for once it seemed like a nice quiet. And as he sat there, warm and peaceful, gaze occasionally drifting over Klaus’ face as he too watched the kids play or the fire dance, Jesper realized that maybe he felt some gratitude for what Klaus was doing for them. More than he’d realized, definitely more than he’d been showing.

He considered the bottom of his empty coffee stained mug, trying to catch hold of the weird squirmy warm feeling inside of him and figure out what all it was made of before it went away again.

He looked up to see Klaus watching the kids with a small smile on his face.

He didn’t realize he was staring until Klaus suddenly moved to stand up.

“I should get the dinner dishes washed up while we’ve still got a little time.” He said. “I’d rather not have them sitting out all night.”

“Hey, you made dinner. Let me take care of the dishes.” Jesper said, surprising himself even as the words left his mouth.

Klaus seemed just as surprised, but Jesper was taking his mug out of his hand and heading towards the door before either of them could think too hard about what was going on.

“Thank you, Jesper.” Klaus said as the door swung shut.

-

When Jesper returned from his best effort at getting the dishes clean the room was startlingly quiet.

He almost didn’t believe what he was seeing. Klaus was sitting in the chair Jesper had left vacant, all the kids somehow finding a place to rest somewhere either on or around him, and they were all fast asleep. Klaus included.

Seriously, why was he so good at getting them settled down? How had he done this? What had Jesper missed while he was washing dishes?

Jesper looked out the window at the dark night sky and sighed, taking a seat in the empty chair Klaus had moved closer to the fire earlier.

He’d wake them up soon, he thought to himself as he looked at all their peaceful little faces and watched the steady rise and fall of Klaus’ chest.

Jesper leaned his head against one hand and tried to fight the urge to fall asleep himself as he sat in the warm quiet room, telling himself he would just sit and watch the fire for a few minutes even though he couldn’t bring himself to look away from Klaus and all the children piled on top of him.

He felt his eyes slowly closing, lazy blinks getting longer and longer, until he opened his eyes to find they were no longer the only ones in the room.

There was a woman, or at least the shape of a woman, standing beside Klaus and the children.

It was no more than a vague outline in the dark, a misty shadow that had gotten up and started walking around on it’s own.

The figure lifted one ghostly, ill-defined hand to Klaus’ cheek, lingering there for a moment before running that same hand almost reverently through Oskar’s tangled red hair.

Jesper blinked and in that small instant the shape had moved from it’s place by the chair to stand directly over him.

He sat there frozen, for a moment everything around him feeling both unreal and sharper than ever, as the shape leaned forward and that undefined misty grey filled his vision.

He felt a barely-there press of warm lips against his forehead and, in the same instant, he heard the words _“Thank you, Jesper”_ whispered right beside his ear.

He closed his eyes again and when he opened them the shape was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some people write Jesper having a breakdown over food insecurity to cope? (It's me, I'm some people)
> 
> But really, I enjoyed writing this chapter. It was good to write some shenanigans again in with all the yearning and angst.
> 
> And Klaus asleep with all the kids on him is directly inspired by some of the first art Lisondraws ever did for this idea! I've never been able to get it out of my head!
> 
> [Link](https://lisondraws.tumblr.com/post/189500254468/sometimes-a-family-is-you-your-husband-from-the)
> 
> Lison, hopefully you don't mind me putting that little scene in my own context! Your art for this au still inspires me!


	11. Do it for Someone Else

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jesper's caught the selflessness bug

Smeerensburg was changing in lots of ways, Jesper knew this. Some of it from things he overheard, some of it from things he saw for himself, and some of it from changes in the way people treated him. (Bread had never been cheaper. Fresh bread.) But some of the most obvious changes were right in front of him every morning when he opened the post office.

Kids didn’t just drop off their letters and run home anymore. The post office yard had become a place children knew they could gather and they didn’t seem in any rush to leave most mornings.

Jesper watched the scattered groups of kids play, leaning against the frame of the open door and slowly collecting the last letters, when Joelle came running up to him.

“Jesper! Jesper! Jesper!” She yelled. “Can I go to Mrs. Myra’s house? Perry and Lily said their pig just had babies the other day! Can I please go see? Please?”

“I don’t know any of these people’s names.” Jesper told her.

He also didn’t know why she was asking his permission all of a sudden. Although, it did occur to him that maybe actually going in someone else’s house hadn’t been a very common occurrence for them up until recently.

Two red-headed children came running up behind her, a little boy and a littler girl. 

Jesper’s disinterest made a quick shift into concern. He frowned. Not everyone in town was experiencing the same sudden and miraculous change of heart, and just because the kids were getting along didn’t mean the parents felt the same way.

“Mom won’t mind.” The boy said, catching on to Jesper’s worried look. “Mrs. Runa’s over almost every day now. Mom gets sad if it’s been a while since her last visit, but we’re not supposed to tell Mrs. Runa that.”

Ignoring the fact that that was yet _another_ name that he didn’t know, Jesper assumed the woman frequenting their house was a Krum and that was why this information had anything at all to do with Joelle getting to see piglets.

“Ok?” Jesper looked between the children, still confused by the entire scenario that had just been put in front of him. “You can go. I guess.”

All three children thanked him and he watched them run off together, Joelle being pulled along by the boy while his sister talked with her excitedly.

That was another change. The kids seemed to be spending more and more time with the other children, even outside of school or the shadow of the post office. Even without each other.

Now that Nelly wasn’t glaring at everyone from the porch or sulking upstairs alone whenever the other kids came around Yvette seemed more than happy to drop her floundering attempts to be The Boss and would run off to make whatever mischief Eleanor felt like getting up to that morning.

Jesper wasn’t sure if Yvette was a bad influence on Eleanor or if Eleanor was a bad influence on Yvette, but he did know that by the end of the day they always had someone mad at them. Which the two girls seemed to find extremely funny.

And while Sophie’s circle of friends hadn’t expanded much she was more than happy to spend her days entertaining her little Saami friend after the girl got tired of trying to talk to Jesper every morning. Listening to the two of them making their own games, even if he couldn’t understand a single word between them, was just part of the background noise of the post office these days.

And the boys would-

Well, he wasn’t sure _what_ exactly the boys were doing today.

They’d split into teams with some of the other children, but for once they were on opposite sides, and what seemed to have started out as an attempt to build some simple barricades out of snow for a snowball fight had turned into some kind of grand architectural competition.

Jesper caught glimpses of the two gradually growing snow structures as he gathered and sorted the mail. Oliver directing the construction of a sprawling set of barricades and little igloos connected by thin tunnels while Oskar’s team focused on building one very tall and unstable structure that had no immediately clear purpose.

But the oddest of all the morning activities had to be Agnes and Nelly sitting at the base of a bare and withered tree with a few of the other less rambunctious children, taking turns reading out loud or helping each other with their homework. The quiet little study group was the strangest sight around the post office, by far.

Not because he didn’t think the girls made good tutors. Agnes was one of the fastest learners he’d ever seen, and no matter what her schoolwork looked like Nelly was clearly a strong reader and very good at math. In her head, at least, if not on paper.

But whether she had the skill for it or not, it was still strange to see Nelly sitting under the tree helping kids sound out words or count by twos. Kids who, only a few days ago, she wouldn’t have come within ten feet of outside of school.

As odd as it all was, that’s just what mornings looked like now. At least, until a certain time would roll around and they would all leave in one great wave.

If the timing of it was anything to go by almost every kid in town seemed to be going to school now, and that left him alone with Sophie and her little friend until the school day was done. Waiting with his bag of letters to see if any of the others wanted to go with him to see Klaus.

The kids could be found up in the woods with him on any given afternoon now, school or no school, and on some long exhausting nights would even stay over again. Which left Jesper with a few quiet but restless hours that he ended up using less for sleeping and more for tidying up and getting the post office looking more like, well, a post office. As best he could at least.

But even if the kids only stayed for the few hours in between school and nightly toy deliveries Jesper and Klaus did their work with the sounds of rowdy children playing in the background and curious little eyes looking over their shoulders more often than not these days.

-

It was during another one of those, now routine, afternoons that Jesper found himself sitting at a table crowded full of wrapped and labeled packages with nothing to do.

Not that they were finished, by any means, but Klaus had taken a “break” to show Nelly and the boys something about a cuckoo clock that had been pushed into one corner and long forgotten and Jesper couldn’t bring himself to interrupt them.

He watched them for a while, Klaus smiling and talking while the kids looked at the thing in fascination, fidgety hands doing their best not to touch without permission. But it only took a few minutes of sitting still for Jesper to lose all momentum and for the tiredness he barely held at bay to start taking hold of him. What could it it hurt to rest his head on the table and close his eyes for a few minutes? They weren’t getting anything done anyways.

But it was more than a few minutes, and when he woke up he didn’t feel the hard wooden boards of the table under his head, or the familiar ache and chill of sleeping uncovered sitting in a chair. 

He felt warm, everything underneath him was soft and when he rolled over he realized the heavy feeling on top of him was layers of thick blankets, the very top one a bright hodgepodge of a patchwork quilt that was beginning to fray at the edges. He ran his fingers gently over the frayed edge tucked up close to his chin, wordlessly wondering how long Klaus had had it and why he would keep something so lovingly made in a guest room.

As the fog of sleep lifted from his mind Jesper also found himself wondering why it was so impossibly quiet. What had Klaus done with the kids? Or, more importantly, what had the kids done with Klaus? All he did was lay there and wonder though, leaving the warm nest of pillows and blankets sounded grossly unappealing.

When he finally brought himself to lift his head up to look around he saw that it wasn’t just the warmth or the heavy blankets making it hard to roll out of bed. The soft mattress had a well worn dip, not quite in the center, and Jesper found himself laying right in the middle of it. Gravity was also telling him to stay right where he was, apparently.

Something niggled at the back of his mind, asking why his first thought had been “guest room” when he was in the home of a man who lived on the other side of the island, miles from town. He hadn’t exactly seemed the hosting type when Jesper first met him.

Suddenly it wasn’t quite so hard to pull himself out of bed, it almost seemed too warm now and for once he was eager for the ever present cold of the island waiting for him outside.

He grabbed his hat and coat from where they were hanging on the post at the end of the bed and his boots from off the floor and walked out to finally investigate why exactly it was so quiet.

He walked down the stairs to a familiar sight, though not exactly the one he’d been expecting.

It was the mirror image of how he’d first seen it, coming through the front door, but there it was. The front room of Klaus’ house with it’s strange emptiness, the door to the kitchen coming into view just off to the side as he stepped further in.

He paused in the middle of the quiet room as it slowly occurred to his sleepy brain that the only way he could’ve made it into the house, and into that bed, was if someone had carried him.

And there was only one someone around here he knew that could’ve carried him, on their own at least.

His thoughts came to a complete stand still as he sat down and started going through the motions of putting his boots back on, some part of his brain deciding it wasn’t worth processing how it was they came to be off his feet in the first place. In fact, it wasn’t worth processing anything at all for the foreseeable future. Not while it was trying so hard to hold on to the phantom, possibly imagined, feeling of strong arms holding him.

It also wasn’t worth processing why he wanted to hold onto that maybe not even real feeling so badly.

He stood up once his boots were tied and walked out the front door, hat still in his hand and coat draped across his arm, and made a beeline for the other building.

Which is where all that noise he’d been wondering about was. He could hear a jumbled mix of laughing and arguing before he was even halfway there.

As soon as he opened the door all eyes were on him.

Nelly leapt onto the table they were all gathered around, spreading her arms wide to cover whatever was behind her. Most of the other children scrambled to do likewise, leaning over the table or telling him not to look.

Yvette screamed “Jesper, get out!”

Jesper looked from the panicked children to Klaus and saw he was watching them with open amusement. Not concerned in the least over whatever it was they didn’t want Jesper to see.

He swept his eyes over the room one last time before covering them and trying not to laugh as he backed carefully out the door, pretending not to see the sawdust in their hair or the paint smeared on their clothes.

“Ok, ok. I’m going.” He said in mock offense.

He stood staring at the door after pulling it closed, listening to the half-panicked chatter of the children on the other side and Klaus’ deep reassuring voice carrying over it. Jesper had no idea what they were getting up to, but if Klaus was supervising it couldn’t be anything too terrible. Right?

-

Thankfully, he didn’t have to wait out in the cold too long before being let back in. Whatever they’d been working on was cleared from the table and out of sight, lots of little fingers covered in dry paint were the only evidence still left behind that they’d gotten up to anything at all while he’d had his little nap.

The kids put some distance between themselves and the adults as they got back to work. Which was probably for the best, some of them were definitely better at keeping secrets than others.

They didn’t go far though, no one was eager to go play outside with the sun quickly disappearing behind the trees, so Klaus and Jesper worked with the sounds of children playing about three or four games all at once coming from just a room over.

All was well until the sounds of rowdy but happy kids was suddenly replaced with hushed angry voices.

The low hum of an argument turned into shouting, followed by a scream and a hard thud.

Jesper had learned to ignore a lot of the terrible noises these kids made, but he’d also learned that some of those noises were more serious than others.

A yell, another thud, more angry words.

And these noises seemed pretty serious.

He looked up at Klaus, who was already looking at him. They both shared a frozen silent moment of “What do we do?” before Jesper sprinted to the next room, Klaus close behind him.

What they found when they got there was Nelly and Yvette in the middle of the most serious fight Jesper had ever seen between the two of them. Punching, shoving, hair pulling, arm twisting. The whole shebang.

The rest of the children were keeping their distance, hanging around the edges of the room and watching the older girls warily.

Jesper had missed whatever had been said right before they’d entered the room, but Yvette had Nelly’s arm twisted behind her back and seemed pretty confident she had the upper hand before Nelly managed to twist around and punch her in the jaw with her free arm.

Yvette let go of Nelly in shock and, not pausing for an instant, Nelly pushed her to the ground. She tried to pin her in place, but Yvette flipped them both and raised a fist in the air, ready to return Nelly’s punch.

Before Yvette could swing her fist Klaus picked her up under the arms and the girl hung in the air in front of him like an angry cat. Jesper helped Nelly up and pulled her back by her shoulders, kneeling down behind her on the floor.

The two girls still glared at each other across the room, eager to finish what they’d started and not in the least bit pleased with the adults holding them back.

“What do you two think you’re doing?” Klaus asked, sounding almost more hurt than angry.

“This isn’t any of your business!” Nelly said, struggling to get out of Jesper’s grasp.

Jesper leaned forward to talk to her at the exact wrong moment. Nelly swung her head back as she tried to shake him off and they collided with a crack that, at least inside Jesper’s head, was shockingly loud.

He swore as he let go of her shoulders and put a hand to his nose. When he looked up Nelly was staring at him, eyes wide.

“Jesper?” Klaus asked, him and the rest of the room also staring with equally stunned expressions. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine.” Jesper said, voice thick and nasally. He pulled his hand away from his face and almost swooned when he saw his palm completely covered in blood. “But maybe I wouldn’t mind a second opinion.”

Klaus dropped Yvette, who landed on her feet with a dull thud, and rushed to help Jesper up.

He helped him find a chair, which was good because Jesper still had white creeping into the edges of his vision. Klaus came back with a clean rag for him to hold under his bloody nose and began trying to figure out how serious things actually were.

After looking Jesper over and asking a few questions about how he felt Klaus seemed to be much more at ease. Jesper wasn’t, it was hard to ignore the blood still running from his nose or the way the ache in the center of his face only seemed to be getting worse.

Klaus pinched the bridge of Jesper’s nose gently.

“Does that hurt?”

“Not any worse than it already did.” Jesper managed to say.

“Good.” Klaus said. “I don’t think you have much to worry about, once the bleeding stops and the swelling goes down.”

He looked at the girls expectantly.

“Are you going to apologize?”

“ _I_ didn’t break his nose.” Yvette said defensively.

“His nose isn’t broken.” Klaus said. “And I don’t just mean to Jesper, you should be apologizing to each other as well.”

Yvette and Nelly both pulled very similar faces at that, and Jesper had to fight the urge to roll his eyes. Usually with these kinds of things “I’m not punching you any more” was the best apology you were going to get.

“Well if I said sorry right now I’d be a liar.” Yvette said, arms crossed. “So I’m not gonna say it.”

No one did anything to stop her as she turned and walked out of the room. Nelly’s face was stormy and Klaus looked defeated but Jesper just felt tired.

Jesper looked at Nelly who was still standing there, glowering at the floor.

"What were you two even fighting about?" He asked her.

"It's not important." She muttered.

"It seemed pretty important a minute ago." He said.

Her eyes darted from Jesper to Klaus then to the floor.

"Can we talk about this later?" She said, her words rushing together.

She seemed more tense than usual, and from Jesper's experience a nervous Nelly was more worrying than an angry Nelly.

"Yeah, ok. It can wait."

-

The next few days were absolutely ordinary. As ordinary as they got in Smeerensburg, at least.

The kids went to school, played with their friends, stayed overnight with Klaus once. Letters were collected, toys were delivered, and there was no mention of sneaky secret projects or things that made them want to beat each other black and blue.

It was as ordinary and boring as it got. Until it wasn’t.

It was early in the afternoon and the kids were still hanging around the post office, no school, no playmates still around, they barely even played together the whole day. It was odd, but seeing as they weren’t doing much worse than occasionally peeking out the window or sitting on the porch looking decidedly bored Jesper just shrugged it off. They were probably just waiting to tag along with him again.

That was his assumption, at least until he heard the sounds of hooves outside and the kids all perked up at once.

“He’s here!” Joelle announced, bouncing to the door.

“Finally.” Yvette grumbled, rolling over in the spot she’d been laying on the floor before pushing herself up.

Jesper stopped what he was doing and followed the kids to the now open door to see what surprise visitor had kept them waiting around the post office all day.

It was Klaus, with the sleigh. Klaus with the sleigh in broad daylight, right outside the post office. Klaus, with just two of the reindeer hitched up to the nearly empty sleigh, the wild animals waiting patiently in the snow as the man stepped out of the sleigh and walked up to the post office.

Jesper looked at him, dumbfounded, as all the kids crowded around to greet him excitedly, barely giving him room to get through the door.

“Is that a bed? In your yard?” Klaus asked as he came in, still looking back over his shoulder at the old sleigh bed-frame that had not moved a single inch since it’s rather memorable trip down the stairs.

“Yes. Yes it is.” Jesper said with false confidence, hoping no further questions on the matter would follow.

He watched nervously as Klaus took in the room. It was tidier than when he’d first arrived, but the walls still had cracks between the boards and the ceiling sagged in places and the chickens had never completely relinquished their nesting boxes for mail sorting.

“You all live here?” Klaus asked cautiously.

“We sleep upstairs!” Joelle answered him enthusiastically. “Jesper calls it the rat’s nest.”

Jesper rushed forward to shush her, barely restraining himself from putting a hand over her mouth.

“What?” She whined at him. “You do!”

“Thank you, that’s enough.” Jesper insisted. It was bad enough Klaus could see this much of the decrepit old post office, he didn’t need to hear about them sleeping on old junkyard mattresses with barely enough blankets to go around, snow still piling up in the corners of the room.

It really wasn’t fair how Klaus’ surprise visit had his stomach all twisted up in knots. He wasn’t the one who’d left the post office neglected, he wasn’t the one who’d spent decades destroying his own town, and he wasn’t even the one who put these kids here.

God, why was he so stressed over things that weren’t even his fault?

But, fault or no fault, Jesper couldn’t help the fact that just having Klaus see that they lived like this was enough to leave him mortified and filled with dread.

What was he so worried about anyways? What did he think Klaus would do? Take the kids away? Yes, please do! Take them away!

But Klaus didn’t say anything about the state of the post office when he finally finished looking it over and shook off the frown that had been growing since he stepped foot inside.

He wasn’t there to inspect their living quarters, he’d brought something with him.

Jesper watched him bring the sleigh’s only cargo in, something tall and flat wrapped in a tarp along with a lumpy rattling bag of tools. He didn’t miss how antsy and excited all the kids were about whatever was going on, even through the continuous background hum of his own tightly wound nerves.

Klaus pulled the tarp off carefully, Joelle supplying an enthusiastic “Ta Da!” as he did so.

It took Jesper a minute to realize what he was looking at.

“A door?”

“The kids mentioned you were having trouble with your old one.” Klaus said, already taking out tools and whatever other little bits and bobs he needed from the bag he’d brought in. “So I made you a replacement.”

“And we helped!” Oskar said, practically shaking with excitement.

“Keeping it a secret was Nelly’s idea.” Agnes added quietly.

Judging by the look of utter betrayal on her face, Nelly would’ve preferred _that_ part stayed a secret. But shy little Agnes just grinned like she’d gotten away with something.

The room grew quiet as Klaus worked, not completely silent, but quiet and still enough that Jesper wondered if Klaus hadn’t asked all the kids to stay out of his way before he’d even got there. There was a certain sense of anticipation hanging over the kids as well, as if they didn’t feel like they could talk to Jesper about his surprise until it was properly installed.

When Klaus was finished he swung the new double-hung door shut and tested the knobs and locks before stepping away, looking at Jesper expectantly.

Not that Jesper noticed, he was too distracted by the seven bright little hand-prints that decorated the bottom half of the inside of the door. Each one in a different color of paint with a name carefully added next to it in matching colors. He was almost a little disappointed there wasn’t a big one on there somewhere to go with them, but down in the right hand corner was a small signature painted in red and that seemed almost as good.

Jesper put a hand over his mouth, unsure of what exactly his face would do if left to it’s own devices.

It wasn’t left to it’s own devices for long though as the kids rushed up to the finished door, excited to show Jesper the proof that they’d helped make it, and he couldn’t help but smile.

“See! Told ya we helped!” Oskar said excitedly, placing a hand over the matching orange print on the door.

“And not just with the painting!” Joelle said, carefully lining her fingers up with her own purple hand-print.

“Hopefully this one holds up a little better.” Klaus said, taking another step back to look at his work. “Do you like it?”

“It’s great.” Jesper said thickly.

And it was. It was so much nicer than the walls surrounding it or the room it opened up on to. But it was so much more than that too.

He hadn’t asked for this, hadn’t ever said he wished the they had a better door or that anything around the post office needed fixing, but there it was. The solution to a problem he hadn’t even thought was worth mentioning.

And not just a solution, Klaus could’ve made something much simpler or even just fixed the hinges, didn’t have to get the kids involved at all. This wasn’t something made for the post office, it was something made for _him._ A part of this building that had been made specifically with him in mind and a part of this building these kids had left their mark on in no uncertain terms.

The door was great. The gesture though, the pure thoughtfulness of it, the excitement they all had just to show it to him, was overwhelming.

When Jesper finally looked away from the door, away from the kids who were still tracing their own hand-prints and chattering over each other, he saw Klaus was smiling at him.

“I’m glad you like it.” He said.

But when Klaus left, when he stepped off the porch and looked back at the post office, that smile melted off his face. He surveyed the building with a a heavy frown, deep lines creasing his forehead.

He didn’t say another word as he left and something in the pit of Jesper’s stomach sank, taking the rest of his good mood down with it.

The kids hadn’t noticed, they were still excited to tell him all about making the door and eager to hear him say he liked it again.

But it took all Jesper had to humor them and not show how terrified he was of what Klaus must think of him now.

-

Klaus’ mood hadn’t improved by the time they started work for the night. If anything, it had gotten worse.

Far too much of their night was spent in uncomfortable silence. Klaus sitting in the sleigh, staring off into the distance with a heavy troubled look on his face while Jesper’s heart hammered in his chest and his mind screamed _Fix This_ without ever offering up any actual solutions.

Less than a dozen words had passed between the two of them by the time they arrived back at the stable to swap out the reindeer for the poor old pony Jesper had arrived with. An extra step to their routine that Jesper found himself, for once, grateful for.

This was his last chance to try and work things out for the night.

It took him longer to steel his nerves than he would’ve liked, but by the time the reindeer were all settled in Jesper had resolved that saying _anything_ would be better than laying awake tonight wondering what Klaus was thinking.

“Hey, uh, listen.” He said, coming up behind Klaus. “I know it looked bad, back there at the post office today, but I promise the kids are doing great. I mean, they’ve been there longer than I have and I couldn’t make them leave that place if I wanted to. Not that I would _want_ to!”

Klaus sighed very very deeply and shut his eyes tight before turning around.

“I know you try to keep things light,”

Jesper frowned. Did he?

“But I also know those kids weren’t just living in that post office for fun. Whatever you have to say isn’t going to make me feel any better about how long they were on their own before you showed up. Or how I could’ve done something for them sooner.” Klaus continued. “They’ve just been there this whole time and all I was doing was sitting up here, all alone, feeling sorry for myself and making birdhouses.”

Well, that was not the direction he was expecting this to go in.

“Klaus, how were you supposed to know?”

“I know what this town’s like, Jesper. It’s been like this since I was barely old enough to leave home. Of course there’d be kids like them! How could there not be?”

Klaus sighed again, sitting down on an old stump and rubbing the bridge of his nose while Jesper still stood dumbfounded in the snow.

“I don’t know what I thought the point of all this was.” Klaus said, almost to himself. “What good I thought I was doing giving away all these toys. What’s the point of giving kids toys if they don’t even have food or shelter or love? I’m not doing good, I’m just trying to make myself feel better. You could’ve taken care of all this on your own if I’d just let you have the toys. You don’t even need me.”

Jesper looked up into starry night sky poking through the tree branches. He would love to be sympathetic towards Klaus right now, keep his mouth shut and just let him say his piece. It would be the right thing to do. Considerate.

But this was too much.

“I’m sorry,” He said. “But exactly which part of this am I supposed to be able to do on my own?”

Klaus looked up at him blankly.

“Y’know, in between dealing with the kids and collecting letters and breaking into every house in town I guess I could just squeeze in picking all the toys and repairing the sleigh and handling the wild animals we’ve somehow managed to attach to it.” Jesper continued. “Do I do maybe more than my fair share of the work? Yes. But if I had to deal with literally any more than what I already do I think I would just lay down in the gutter and die.”

Klaus frowned in concern, but Jesper talked over anything he might’ve said.

“And besides all the toy stuff! You make the kids happy, you cook us dinner, you made me a whole entire door. That’s not nothing! Maybe you weren’t doing anything for them before, but you’re doing plenty for them now.”

Jesper walked aimlessly in a tight circle, rubbing his tired eyes. This man! The kids had all fallen in love with him, along with half the town. He was almost miraculously good at everything he did, and aside from some awkward introductions had only ever been painfully selfless. And here he was! Sitting in the woods saying he didn’t feel like he was doing enough.

God, if he wasn’t his friend. If he wasn’t...

Jesper stopped and turned back to Klaus.

“Sorry, sorry. You just wanted the chance to complain and here I am giving you a lecture. That’s not fair. Complaining is great. I love complaining.”

Jesper’s aimless circling had brought him much closer to Klaus than when he’d first started talking.

He looked down at the man, at his wet eyes and slumped shoulders, and wondered what else he could possibly say. What could he say that wouldn’t just make him feel even worse?

He was so stuck on finding the right words that he was caught completely off guard when Klaus reached up and wrapped both arms around him, pulling Jesper tight against his chest.

“Thank you.” Klaus said, very close to his ear, voice choked with emotion.

Oh. Ok. Maybe he’d already used all the words he needed to.

Jesper relaxed into the hug and took a deep, relieved breath as he rested his forehead on Klaus’ shoulder. Happy to stay just like that for as long as Klaus needed him to.

-

When Jesper finally made it back to the post office that night he closed the new door as quietly and carefully as he could, feeling a certain warmth as he did so despite how cold the metal knob in his hand was.

He looked at the outline of the door in the dark for a moment before turning to find he wasn’t the only one still up.

Nelly sat at the side of the desk, frowning over some homework that Jesper knew she’d get in no trouble for not completing. He wasn’t sure why she felt like working on it now, when everyone else had gone to bed already.

“So,” He drawled, pulling a seat up next to her and hoping he wouldn’t regret this. “What are you working on?”

“Geography.” She muttered, barely glancing up at him as she gestured to the book in front of her. It was the atlas she’d borrowed from Alva, he was surprised she still had it.

“Do you want any help?”

Nelly slumped down in her chair.

“No.” She said, looking down at the floor. “I mean, it’s not really for school.”

“Then why are you bothering with it so late at night?” He tried to see what she’d been writing but her arms were spread out across her paper in a way that was probably meant to look casual.

“It’s easier to think when everyone else is asleep. I was just curious.”

“Curious about what?”

She mumbled something, eyes still averted.

“I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” Jesper asked. “Or was that meant for the chickens?”

“About where you came from.” She repeated through a grimace. “You and Klaus and everyone else.”

“Oh.” Jesper watched as she looked at the open pages of the atlas in front of her. “Well, I can’t help with all of that, but I can show you where I grew up.”

He took the book and turned it at an angle they could both see it clearly from without much difficulty and began flipping through the pages.

“Here we are.” He said, stopping at a very familiar outline and placing a finger on the page. “I’ve spent most of my life right here.”

“Doesn’t the little star mean that that’s the capital?” Nelly asked, looking at where Jesper was pointing.

“Yep. That’s where my Dad works, most of the time. Our main house is just outside the city proper. We’ve got a few other properties though, I think the summer house by the west coast is my favorite.” He said, sliding his finger along the page. “It’s a little small and a bit of a trip, but it’s worth it for the beach. Y’know, a real beach. Not whatever it is you’ve got going on here.”

Nelly frowned.

“What makes it more real than the beaches here?”

“Trust me, if you ever get to see it you’ll understand.”

Nelly’s confused frown just grew deeper.

“And you can even see Smeerensburg right here.” He said, feeling an eerie sense of deja-vu as he moved his finger up the map to the island near the top.

Nelly took her thumb and forefinger and held them apart to measure the distance between where Jesper had pointed to his home and the “real” beach near the coast. Then, holding her fingers carefully in the same position repeated it across land and sea until she reached the little island that was all she’d ever known of the world.

“I never realized we were so far away from everyone else.” She said softly.

“It’s not that bad.” Jesper told her. “A couple hours on the ferry to get to the mainland. But then, I guess it is about a day or two’s ride before you get to anywhere really worth going from there. I’ve taken much longer trips just for fun, trust me.”

“Really?” Nelly asked, her eyes lighting up in that certain way that he’d only ever seen when Klaus was showing her something. “Where?”

He flipped a few more pages, looking for a wider view of the world.

“I’ve been to Paris and London and Berlin, used to take little trips all over with my parents when I was younger, stayed in Amsterdam for school for a few weeks.” He told her as he pointed each place out on the page before flipping to another one. “Went to America once. Spent a few hours in Virginia, until Mom said it was boring and decided we should go to New York instead before we’d even settled in the hotel.”

Nelly squinted at the page.

“Those places aren’t even close to each other.” She said. “Not at all.”

“It was a _long_ night.” Jesper laughed. “But that’s kinda just how my Mom is. Loves to travel, hates being bored.”

Nelly’s fascinated gaze turned back to him.

“Does your dad like to travel too?”

“My Dad would much rather be right here,” Jesper said, turning back to the page they’d started on and tapping a finger in the vague area of the central post office. “Making sure the world is still running, efficiently and on time. It’s what he does.”

“Does he really like that?” Nelly asked, looking back to the map. “Just staying in one place all the time?”

“I think, in a way, he feels like the rest of the world comes to him. He told me once ‘You see the whole world pass through your hands when you carry the mail, Jespie’.” Jesper laughed shortly. “I don’t think I’m seeing much of that here though.”

That short bitter laugh settled oddly in the quiet room and Jesper’s thoughts wandered as Nelly studied the open atlas on her own again.

He wondered how many other places his mother had been this year, wondered when she’d found out he was gone. His parents only wrote to each other sparingly while they were apart, ironically. They seemed to prefer saving everything they wanted to say to each other up for when they could speak in person, sitting up all night together, his father doing most of the listening and his mother doing most of the talking. Jesper could remember waking up on mornings after his mother had returned from one trip or another and seeing the two of them sitting exactly where they were the night before.

Thoughts of his parents and their late nights melted into other old memories in his tired mind. Memories of his mother letting him paint with her, or of the excitement he felt seeing his father come home after a long day. Good memories that, right then, were only making him sad.

Jesper vaguely recalled something he’d heard in school or as an anecdote at a party, he wasn’t sure which, about how nostalgia was originally considered a medical condition. Something unwanted. Homesickness, but with a doctor’s note.

He’d love some kind of treatment for what he was feeling now, love to go back to just missing silk sheets and fine food and parties instead of people.

He pushed the feeling down and looked at the stairs, thinking about how good it would feel to at least rest his eyes for a little bit. But something in him was nagging at him, telling him that now was the perfect opportunity to talk about things that he hadn’t actually planned on bringing up again.

“So,” He said, still looking over his shoulder at the stairs. “What were you and Yvette fighting about the other day?”

“She said we should forget about the town and the post office and you and just stay with Mr. Klaus.” Nelly said quietly, gaze strongly fixed on the paper in front of her.

“Oh.” That definitely wasn’t what he’d been expecting. Not the kind of thing he would’ve thought was worth a fist fight. “Well, maybe you should.”

Nelly looked up at him then, eyes wide with shock and hurt.

“What? Why?”

“I mean, it’s better than living here. That’s for sure.” Jesper trailed off, thinking about warm meals and laughter in the snow and quiet nights by the fire with a strange ache in his chest.

Nelly had returned to her work, a troubled frown still on her face, when a thought occurred to Jesper.

“But hey, maybe it’s not even worth worrying about. Now that the feud has died down your families might want to come get you.”

Nelly’s pencil skidded sharply off her paper, snapping the tip off and leaving a long jagged line across the desk.

“No.” She said flatly.

“But don’t you miss your mom?” Jesper asked, biting back the very childish urge to add ‘I miss my mom’. _His_ mom hadn’t dropped him off at an abandoned building and never returned. “You wouldn’t be happy if she came back for you?”

“I don’t want her back! She doesn’t get to just take me back!” Nelly said, a note of panic creeping into her voice. “She used to be so nice to me, and when everyone else made her sad I used to be able to make her happy. At least, I thought I did. But she decided I was worth getting rid of to make other people happy, so I don’t care what she wants anymore.”

Nelly picked her pencil back up and the two of them sat in stony silence. Jesper watched her try to write with the broken pencil tip, faster than she normally would, her letters blurring together in a winding script that only she could read.

“And even if I forgive my mom that wouldn’t help anybody but me.” She added suddenly, fidgeting with her pencil. “I’m pretty sure Yvette’s mom left town, Joelle’s aunt and uncle got sick of her and locked her out, and everybody else just got forgotten about. Nobody’s coming to get us.” She said, in a tone of finality no one her age should be so familiar with. “So you can just forget about that idea.”

“Well you have to go somewhere after this year.” Jesper insisted. “If it looks like the post office is running Smeerensburg is probably going to get sent a new postman, a real one, you’ll end up getting moved whether you like it or not. And if you don’t want to stay with Klaus or someone in town I don’t know where you’re going to go. I’m leaving. And it’s not like I can take you with me.”

Something clicked in Jesper’s head as he looked at Nelly’s down-turned face.

“Hey, but what if I did? What if I just took you with me?”

It was a split second thought, he’d said it at the exact same moment that he’d thought it, but something in Jesper was already convinced that she’d like this option. That this was the magic solution, the secret answer she’d been looking for. And he was suddenly excited to see her face light up, see her happier than he’d ever seen her before.

But that’s not what happened.

“No.” She said, yet again.

“What do you mean ‘no’?” He asked. “We’ve got plenty of space back home. Even if we stay at one of the summer houses or in an apartment downtown there’d be more space for all of you there than there is here. And don’t worry about what my parents will say, they’ll probably just be happy I’m doing something for someone other than myself. And once I can use family money again we can get you new clothes and the best tutors and more food than you’ve ever seen in your life.”

Jesper was surprised at how excited he was at this idea. How exciting it was to think of providing these kids with anything they could want, making it so they never had to worry about food again, giving them a place to sleep that didn’t have holes in the roof. It was shining clear and beautiful in his mind’s eye. He never would’ve imagined wanting something like this, but now it seemed perfect.

“No.” Nelly repeated, her voice sad and wobbly. “We’re not leaving Smeerensburg.”

"Why? What good has this place ever done for you? Admit it, you all have been better off since I got here. What are you gonna do when I'm gone?"

And why was she so interested in getting a bigger view of the world if she never wanted to see anything outside this island?

“We don’t need you.” Nelly said quietly, voice shaking.

“I’m not saying you _need_ me!” Jesper could hear the desperation creeping into his voice. “I’m saying I want to help you! I’m on your side! I know we got off to a rocky start, all of us, but I mean it now. I’m on your side.”

Jesper leaned over, putting a hand on Nelly’s shoulder and looking her in the eye.

“And I don’t even care who’s on the other side. It might be me sometimes! But I’m on _your_ side.”

Nelly broke eye contact and looked at the floor, her eyes shiny and wet.

"At least think about it, ok?” Jesper said softly as he stood up. “The year’s not up yet. Still a long way to go before that 6,000th letter."

-

Nelly lay awake that night until she was certain Jesper was asleep. She rolled over, looking at his still shape in the dark for a good minute or two before crawling over to Yvette and giving her a rough shove.

“Wha?” Yvette grumbled, rubbing her still closed eyes.

“Emergency meeting.” Nelly whispered.

Yvette frowned at her. “For what?”

“I’ll tell you at the meeting.”

Yvette rolled her eyes but scooted a few inches over to wake up Joelle and pass the message along while Nelly nudged Agnes awake.

The message carried across the room like that until everyone was awake, everyone except Jesper, and they began quietly making their way down the stairs. Even Sophie, who had quietly wiggled her way out of Jesper’s arms.

They all barely dared to breath when Oskar accidentally stepped on Jesper’s still form as he moved carelessly across the room, the boy barely catching himself as he tripped over him, but Jesper just rolled over and they soon continued on their way down the stairs and out the door.

They walked through the snow until they were just inside the town proper and all filed into an abandoned old shed which, much like the post office, had seen better days.

The shed stood next to the burnt out remains of the house it used to belong to and was still a good distance away from the next nearest house.

They’d used it as something of a secret base for a few years now, mostly to hide from other children (and the occasional adult) during the day or to stash things until they found a better hiding place for them. Things like scarves and sleds and hair ribbons. Things that had been stolen more out of vindictiveness than need. Things that wouldn’t be kept but planted on someone else later, just to watch two kids who’d picked on them go after each other instead.

But after Jesper had arrived it had gained a new use; secret emergency meetings.

They used to save important discussions for when they were safe back home, back at the post office, but with Jesper coming and going they’d felt the need to have some conversations under a different roof. What little of a roof there was.

Nelly carefully lit a candle, looking around the room at everyone gathered close together in the dark and silently counting them all three times over before she felt confident they hadn’t lost anyone along the way.

The other children all looked at her expectantly, they still had no idea what she wanted to tell them and why it couldn’t wait until morning.

“Jesper’s asked us to go live with him when he leaves.”

Nelly braced herself for the unanimously positive response she knew this would get, and the way she’d have to dig her heels in and be the bad guy in order for any rational thought to be put into making this decision.

And it was a very positive response, at first.

But the excitement slowly dwindled as the reality of that offer settled in.

“Wait. You mean like, leave Smeerensburg? Forever?” Oskar asked. “What about Mr. Klaus?”

“We could still visit though, couldn’t we?” Oliver asked uncertainly.

Nelly shook her head. “It’s too far away.”

“But we can just take the ferry back!” Yvette insisted. “That’s what it’s for!”

“It’s too far away.” Nelly repeated firmly. “Taking the ferry isn’t like riding up into the mountains. Even if we visit we won’t see Mr. Klaus a few times a week anymore. Not even once a week. And we won’t go to school with Miss Alva anymore either.”

“I don’t think I want to go.” Agnes said stiffly, staring blankly down at her hands in her lap.

“I don’t want to go either.” Joelle said. “I think Yvette was right, we should go live with Mr. Klaus.”

Agnes’ lip wobbled. “But I want to stay with Jesper.” She said miserably, tears threatening to spill.

“I think Jesper should come live with Mr. Klaus too.” Joelle said confidently.

There was a lot of excitement at that idea, a lot of noise.

But Nelly didn’t say anything. She’d been thinking it too, ever since the first night they’d all had dinner together. It seemed perfect. But if something seemed perfect that always meant that you weren’t gonna get it.

“Well nobody gave us that option.” She said loudly over everyone else’s excitement, bitter that she once again had to be the one dousing their hopes and bringing them back down to reality. “So we have to pick just one of them. And Mr. Klaus never even asked us to stay with him. Jesper did.”

Everyone looked at her, a mixture of disappointment and confusion on their faces.

“So what do ya think we should do?” Yvette asked. “You’re makin’ it sound like all our choices are the bad one.”

Nelly took a deep breath, ready to get into the _real_ discussion now that she’d made it clear there would be no _perfect_ option.

-

Jesper woke up alone the next morning, wondering for a moment if he’d left the kids with Klaus again and just forgotten but he quickly remembered the conversation he’d had with Nelly and, instead, wondered miserably if maybe the offer to take them away from Smeerensburg had finally been a step too far and they’d all just run away to find some other derelict old building to squat in.

As he pulled himself up and off the mattress, using no small amount of willpower to ready himself for another day, he tried to tell himself it probably wasn’t anything so dramatic. But he couldn’t shake his worries off entirely. Or the vague memory of being stepped on in the middle of the night, for that matter.

It didn’t help that he still hadn’t seen hide nor hair of any of them by the time he’d finished collecting the day’s letters.

 _They just didn’t tell you before leaving for school_ , he thought to himself. Which was cold comfort, with even Sophie nowhere to be seen.

But they all had friends now, all had other places they could be welcome and safe for a few hours. It was just a coincidence, that they all wanted to be out and away from him right after the very emotional conversation between him and Nelly. Just a coincidence.

Jesper spent the rest of his day going through the motions, trying to focus only on deliveries for the rest of the evening. When Klaus asked about the kids he did his best to sound natural when he told him they were fine. He didn’t know how to talk about what was eating him up inside just yet. Didn’t know how to think about it either.

When he stepped back into the post office at the end of the night he paused at the bottom of the stairs, unable to bring himself to climb them and see if the room was still as cold and empty as it had been that morning.

He sighed and sat behind the desk, setting his hat to one side and shrugging his bag off. He stared at the door Klaus had made, the bright little hand prints still just barely visible in the dark, before laying his head on the desk’s familiar surface.

He had only shut his eyes for a few seconds before he heard someone, very pointedly and loudly, clear their throat.

Jesper looked up to see all the kids in front of the desk, serious looks on their faces and Nelly with her hands clasped behind her back and her chin held high.

"Jesper," She said, a small waver in her voice. "We've decided to take you up on your offer. We wanna go with you. When you leave. We wanna go with you."

Before he knew what he was doing Jesper had stood up and gone around the desk, pulling the prickly girl into a hug. He let himself fall to his knees on the floor as she hugged him back and held on tight. The others found their way into the hug and Jesper was practically crushed under the weight of seven kids clinging to him like their lives depended on it.

Less than a year ago he firmly believed these brats were going to kill him in his sleep and now it felt like his whole world would come to an end if he ever let them go.

It took a while for the kids to fall asleep after that. They all lay awake together asking Jesper questions about his home and his family and all the things they’d get to do. The boys seemed very excited about his mother’s love of painting and Joelle asked if she could bring Chekhov, to which Jesper said he’d think about it. The excitement kept them up for hours.

Jesper lay awake even longer, emotionally exhausted kids all fast asleep on and around him as he stared up at the little bit of night sky that poked through the cracks in the ceiling and wondered at the feeling of contentment that had settled in his chest.

What had happened to the Jesper that couldn’t wait for the day he’d never have to see these brats ever again? What happened to wishing every single day that he could go back to not having to worry about anyone but himself again?

He tried to imagine it but he couldn't. He couldn't picture himself waking up in the morning without the sounds of Joelle trying (and failing) to be quiet while looking for the toad she'd snuck in the night before, or the sound of the boys making up nonsense songs while the sun was barely up. Pretending to be fascinated by the pinecones and rocks that Sophie brought to him.

He couldn't imagine it.

He didn't want the same things he wanted before.

-

Jesper’s greatly improved mood did not go unnoticed by Klaus the next day.

“Did something happen?” He asked, smiling as he watched Jesper sort packages with a little extra spring in his step. 

“I’m just having a good day.” Jesper shrugged. “Maybe it’s the rare chance for some real peace and quiet, the kind that doesn’t make me feel like I’ve got something to be _suspicious_ about.”

As anxious as their absence had made him the day before, Jesper honestly couldn’t have been happier that, today of all days, the kids had all decided they had better things to do than hang around with him and Klaus. He didn’t want anyone letting it slip that they were planning a mass exodus at the end of the year. Not before he’d figured out how to tell Klaus about it himself.

Which he wasn’t looking forward to doing. He’d never even figured out how tell Klaus he was leaving in the first place. Never thought he’d care enough to bother with goodbyes.

But for right now he’d decided that goodbyes were a problem for Future Jesper to deal with and Present Jesper was going to enjoy feeling happy and excited about things while he could.

“I suppose it is kind of nice.” Klaus said, picking their conversation back up after a few minutes of unrelated joking. “Having some time together without the kids.”

Jesper was glad he had his back to Klaus right then, his face felt very warm all of a sudden.

“For a little while at least.” Klaus continued.

And, oh. No more warm face to worry about now. In fact, all the warmth he’d felt a second ago was gone. Jesper’s heart sank. Klaus would be getting lots of time without the kids soon enough. Lots of time without him too.

Thankfully Klaus hadn’t caught on to the sudden slump in Jesper’s mood and his good cheer carried them through the rest of their work. By the time they were ready to load up the sleigh for the night Jesper had gone back to pretending his problems could wait for another day.

But his heart sank again as he turned to shut the door and got a good second look at the place. The room that had once been so full of toys that he was tripping over them was now nearly barren.

“Say, we’re kinda running low on inventory, aren’t we?” Jesper asked nervously as he climbed into the sleigh

“Yes, only a couple more trips and that should do it.” Klaus said, as if that were a _good thing._ Then, a bit more awkwardly. “You must be looking forward to no more night shifts?”

“Yeah.” Jesper said flatly.

“Yeah, me too.”

As they pulled away Jesper’s thoughts still lingered numbly on the empty shelves and the weight of not only his own future but that of the seven other little futures he’d just willingly placed on his shoulders.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is almost 10,000 words long and I wrote it in a month and I don't know what else to say about it at this point.
> 
> I've been thinking about these scenes for so long that it's hard to imagine what it must be like reading them for the first time, I hope they have at least some of the impact that I originally felt they'd have. I feel like I've been building up to a lot of this chapter for so long!
> 
> Edit: I remember what I was going to say! I wrote the absolute smallest amount of geography and it almost killed me! Why did I center an emotional scene around geography!?
> 
> Also, Mrs. Runa and Mrs. "Myra" are the two ladies who bond over being passive aggressive over berries. Favorite background pairing along with the dad of the little Krum boy who gets the frog and his Ellingboe neighbor. It really is easy to assume Smeerensburg is just full of widows and widowers, huh?


	12. "Christmas!"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jesper realizes something, and then realizes something else, and then realizes something else, and then realizes something else, and then realizes something else, and then realizes one more tiny little thing.

Jesper hadn’t expected to feel so burdened by the end of the day, everything had seemed so perfect that morning. So optimistic. He’d been so excited for things he never would’ve wanted at the start of the year.

And soon there would be no more toys.

No toys, no letters, no going home. Not for anyone.

He’d broken a lot of promises in his day, but this had to be a new record for speed.

What was he going to tell the kids? They’d been so excited just last night, talking with him about what their new lives would be like. He couldn’t take all that back. Not so soon.

What was he going to tell the kids? Nothing. Not yet. Not until he figured out how he was going to fix this.

But of course he couldn’t be allowed a minute to himself to think it over.

It was dead of night, in only an hour or two the children of Smeerensburg would be waking up to find their requests for toys fulfilled.

And yet his porch was covered in kids. Kids playing just as if it was the middle of the afternoon.

His seven little worries and the post office’s most frequent visitor.

“What are you all still doing out here?”

“Playing.” Oliver said plainly, scooping his scattered blocks into a pile.

“Yes, I can see that much.” Jesper told him. “Um, why now?”

“She never went home.” Yvette said, poking Sophie’s little Saami friend in the cheek.

Jesper looked down at the cheerful little girl who did, in fact, seem to be the center of attention for this strange play-date.

“Well maybe she hasn’t left because you’ve made staying here too much fun.” He said, as if he were accusing them of some grand conspiracy. “You shouldn’t keep her here. I’m sure she’s got people worrying about where she is.”

The kids all looked at him skeptically. Agnes frowned, Yvette scoffed.

The idea that someone would be worrying about where a child was in the middle of the night seemed to be a foreign concept to them.

Jesper sighed.

“Just get inside and let the poor girl go home.”

Yvette was the first one on her feet.

“Ok. Fine, _Dad_.”

Despite the thick sarcastic tone it was said in, that one word hit him like a ton of bricks. But he shook it off. She was obviously just making fun of him for bossing them around.

To his surprise they all started cleaning up with minimal grumbling, scooping their toys up quickly before heading back inside.

And then Agnes turned to him and said “Goodnight, Dad”.

And then Joelle said it too.

And then the boys said it, doing their best to wave at him without dropping their armloads of blocks.

Jesper didn’t know what to make of all that. He felt a warmth in his chest but his legs were suddenly jelly.

_Dad_

But even through his shock he didn’t miss how Nelly’s face grew more and more sour at each utterance of the word, a heavy frown settling in deeper at every warm wish goodnight.

She was the last one to get up, sitting beside the Saami girl with that sour look on her face. Once they were all gone she quietly scanned the porch for any left behind toys before heading for the door herself.

“Hey, hold up. What’s the matter with you?” Jesper asked before she could even reach for the handle.

“What?” She asked, startled. “What are you talking about?”

“Look, I don’t know what all _that_ was about.” He said gesturing vaguely at the door. “But I know you’re not happy about it. What’s going on?”

Nelly scrunched her face up tight.

“This morning Yvette called you dad on our way to school. She was just joking. Joking about how all the other kids are gonna start sucking up to us once they find out we’ve got a rich dad now.”

Jesper’s eyebrows shot up. God, they better not. That was not nearly as much fun as it sounded like. People pretending to like you for your parents money was not a fate he would’ve wished on these kids even at their worst.

“And I reminded her we weren’t supposed to talk about that at school.” Nelly continued. “And she shoved me and I shoved her back and she shut up about it but then Agnes got all happy and asked if you were really our dad now.”

She was worrying her hands, wringing them together and squeezing her fingers. Her words were coming out faster and faster.

“And before I could say anything everyone else just seemed to decide that you were!” She practically yelled, distress creeping into her voice. “And Joelle and Oskar started calling you that at school and now everyone else is calling you our dad too!”

“Why does that bother you so much?” Jesper asked cautiously.

“You said you wanted us to come with you when you leave.” She told him. “You didn’t say you wanted to be our dad.”

“Well, wouldn’t I be?” He asked, almost to himself. “If I give you a home and make sure you’re safe and you have clothes and food? Isn’t that what a dad does?”

“I don’t know, I never had one before.” Nelly said quietly, suddenly finding the warped boards of the porch absolutely fascinating.

“And I’ve never been one before, so I guess we’ll have to figure this thing out together.” Jesper said, mustering up as much confidence as he could manage.

Nelly looked up at him, still frowning but her face had softened. She nodded silently before reaching for the door.

“Wait, hold on!” Jesper called to her again. He’d said they’d figure this out together, might as well get started on that now. “Can I talk to you about one more thing real quick?”

“Yeah.” She said, turning back to him. “What?”

“Well just if, for some reason, some purely hypothetical reason, I don’t get all the letters I need by the end of the year we might need to change our plans a little bit.” He said, surprised at how hard it was to get the words out. “A backup plan, a Plan B. A purely hypothetical Plan B.”

“And what’s Plan B supposed to be, exactly.” She asked cautiously.

Jesper looked up over her head at the post office.

“Just staying here, I guess.” He said. “All of us. Right here.”

Nelly still looked troubled, but some of the tension eased out of her shoulders at hearing “all of us”.

Jesper looked down at her and the worry he could see on her face seemed to snap him out of his own, for a moment.

“Hey, but it’s only Plan B. Ok?” He said, trying to force some cheer into his voice. “Second best option. We’re still trying for Plan A. You don’t even need to tell everyone else about it. Not yet. It’s just- Just Plan B.”

“Just Plan B.” She repeated, nodding her head as she looked at him from across the porch.

“Just Plan B.” Jesper said again, as if he were answering a question. Giving some kind of assurance that everything would still work out ok.

Nelly looked down again, her brow furrowed for a moment, and then back up at him with wide vulnerable eyes before pulling the door open and quietly slipping inside.

Jesper wondered if maybe he shouldn’t have said anything after all, or maybe that he hadn’t said enough, but before he could follow his impulse to go after her and just keep talking and talking until he found the words that would make her stop worrying he felt a little hand tug at the edge of his coat.

Sophie’s little friend smiled up at him.

He looked down at the girl in confusion. What was she still doing here?

Jesper scowled and rubbed his tired eyes as he stepped up to the door.

“Run along home now.” He told her. “You can’t sit on the porch all night, and we’re full up in here already.”

He reached for the doorknob but froze as soon as he touched it.

What was he going to tell them? What was he really going to tell them if he couldn’t figure this out?

That vague Plan B stuff he’d told Nelly wouldn’t hold up for long, not with all of them. He’d have to explain eventually. That they were done with the toys, done with the letters, done with going home to nice clothes and expensive tutors and grandparents who would actually be excited to meet them.

He wondered for a moment if his Dad would change his mind about anything if he told him about the kids. Would he send him more money? Maybe even let him come home? Would the kids be enough proof that he was taking his responsibilities seriously for once? Or would it all just sound like another lie? He’d told enough of them. He wouldn’t be surprised if his Dad went full Boy Who Cried Wolf on him at this point and just assumed lying was all he ever did now.

The little girl took advantage of his hesitation to call to him again.

Jesper closed his eyes tight in frustration, leaning his forehead against the door.

“Listen,” He said to her. “I don’t have time for this. It’s almost Christmas already and if I don’t get those letters-”

He opened his eyes, standing up straight as his brain lit up like a sparkler.

“That’s it! Christmas!”

He was suddenly full of so much energy and no idea what to do with it, he floundered and sputtered for a moment before finally reaching for the door.

“Now seriously,” He said, in a brief moment of calm. Looking down at the girl as he peeked around the door. “Go home. You’re trespassing.”

Jesper shut the door and took a deep breath, trying to get his racing thoughts in order as a plan fell into place.

He gathered up whatever he could find that could charitably be called art supplies. Broken crayons, dull pencils, paper from his stock of letter writing kits. He dumped it all on the desk, idea still forming in his head.

He was grateful that his moment of inspiration had come after the kids had gone off to bed, grateful for the chance to work undisturbed.

At least he was, until a certain curious pair decided sleep wasn’t nearly as interesting as all that ruckus downstairs.

Oliver peeked over the top of the desk.

“Can we help?” He asked, voice quiet but eager. Oskar was already reaching for a crayon beside him.

“What? No.” Jesper told them. “No, I want to get this done as quickly as possible.”

“But _Daaad_ -” Oskar whined, still clutching a fistful of crayons as he pouted.

“Uh uh.” Jesper interrupted him, pointing a finger in the boy’s face. “You don’t get to _‘Dad’_ me like that. _‘Dad’_ isn’t some magical code word that gets me to do whatever you want. Trust me,” He continued, sitting down and looking at the blank paper in front of him. “It doesn’t work that way.”

“Well I still wanna help.” Oskar said. He still had a tight grip on the crayons and behind him Oliver had taken advantage of the argument to start quietly working on his own drawing.

Jesper groaned. “You don’t even know what I’m doing.”

And he’d really been hoping not to tell them.

“Yes we do!” Oskar insisted. “You’re drawing pictures!”

Jesper felt a headache coming on. He was not up for another extremely circular argument with this child right now.

“Ok, fine. Y’know what,” he said, starting to separate the meager art supplies into piles. “We’ll work together. I’ll draw and you can color. You can handle that, right?”

“Yes!” Both boys yelled excitedly.

“Hey,” Jesper shushed them. “If you wanna help you have to be quiet. Can’t wake up the girls.”

“Ok.” Oskar said, in one of the loudest whispers Jesper had ever heard, while Oliver just silently nodded his head.

“Good.”

They sat for a while and worked quietly together, Jesper handing off pages to the boys and occasionally looking over to make sure they weren’t getting too creative with their color choices.

“Wow,” Oskar said, watching Jesper work while he waited for another page to color. “You’re a really good draw-er.”

“Huh?” Jesper looked up, startled out of his concentration, and then back down at the hastily drawn picture of happy children in front of him. “No, I’m really not.”

“Yeah you are.” Oskar insisted.

“I like that you drew Mr. Klaus smiling.” Oliver added as he carefully colored in the little doodle-Jesper’s uniform. “I like it when he smiles.”

“Oh. Uh, thanks.” Jesper said, startled by the choice in compliment. “I like it when he smiles too.”

The boys grew tired of working on Jesper’s project long before it was finished and Jesper still ended up doing most of the work himself, finishing up the half colored pictures while the boys were absorbed in their own drawings.

He’d actually found it relaxing to sit and make art with the two of them, but by the time he was done his heart was racing. Thinking of what he was about to propose to Klaus had almost washed all his tiredness and worry away and he was buzzing with energy.

Jesper carefully rolled the finished pictures up and rushed out the door. Wishing the boys a hasty goodnight as he left them still coloring at the desk, despite the sun having found it’s way up over the horizon by the time he’d finished plotting.

-

Klaus was spending his morning the same way he’d spent many, many mornings over the years. Especially those mornings when he didn’t want to be left alone with his own thoughts.

The sound of splitting wood and the heavy, reliable feel of his ax in his hands always seemed to help him center himself. Even when he knew nothing about the world around him would’ve changed by the time he stopped.

No turning back time, no unspoken things finally spoken. Just more chopped wood.

More chopped wood and a few hours of not thinking about how close he might be to the end of the brightest period of his life in years.

He’d tried not to let Jesper know how much running out of toys actually bothered him.

He should be happy. Happy that those toys were finally bringing children joy. And he was, happy about that part at least.

He just didn’t want Jesper to know how much he would miss working together, how much he would miss spending almost every day together, how much he would miss having dinner with him and the kids.

But good friends didn’t just disappear from your life when their business with you was done, right?

He wasn’t sure anymore, it had been a long time since he’d had a good friend.

And an even longer time since he could picture himself with anyone other than his Lydia.

When he’d first noticed the strength of his feelings for Jesper he’d thought maybe he’d just forgotten what it felt like to have a friend, thought maybe he’d been alone for so long that letting someone in again just felt more intense than he remembered.

He wasn’t so sure about that anymore.

Had actually been pretty sure it _was_ more than that for a while now.

There was a voice in the back of his head saying he should just tell him, tell Jesper how he felt. Sometimes he almost thought it sounded like Lydia’s voice. But that was probably wishful thinking, imagining that she would approve.

The wind picked up, running through his hair and whipping up the snow around his feet.

He picked up another log, continuing to chop, but a memory came to him as he fell into the rhythm of his work.

Lydia was sitting up in bed, trying to get him to lay down next to her. Pulling on his arm with what little strength she still had, a bright smile on her face despite the dark circles under her eyes. He remembered feeling so tired, but he couldn’t let himself rest. It felt like everything would be fine if he just kept doing things for her. He couldn’t let himself run out of things to do, couldn’t take a break. And definitely couldn’t tell her how hard all this was for him. Even if she already knew.

He couldn’t remember exactly what they were talking about. He could see her mouth move and feel the inflection of his own voice, but the only words he could hear clearly was Lydia telling him

_“Don’t you deserve to be happy too?”_

He dropped the ax, rubbing his eyes with both hands.

This wasn’t the same. This wasn’t two young hopeful people falling in love with each other and planning a life together. Jesper had his own life. And even if he wanted Klaus to be a part of it he wouldn’t be getting the same man Lydia had gotten.

But those thoughts seemed to fade into the background and all he was left with was the awful yearning to just lay down next to someone he cared about. To hold them and make sure they knew they were loved.

It wasn’t just enjoying having Jesper around, it was wanting him to always be around. Wanting them to have a future together. The way he’d wanted to have a future with Lydia.

He’d spent so long looking back at the past, it had been a long time since he’d even wanted to have a future at all.

The wind picked up again, rattling the birdhouses loudly and rustling up leaves and snow close to the ground creating a nearly invisible trail that led right back up to his old workshop.

He knew that, rationally, it was nothing. Just the way the wind found it’s way through the trees.

But there was something about it, something he wasn’t even quite willing to admit to himself, that always made him feel a little less lonely.

There were moments when the wind would blow like this and he hoped he was getting closer to seeing his Lydia again. Hoped his lonely days were coming to an end. One way or another. He knew she wouldn’t want him to think like that, but sometimes that fantasy was all that kept him going. Or, at least it used to be.

He followed that wind to the open door of the workshop and what was real and what was fantasy blurred together as he saw the shape of a person moving behind the yellow curtain draped across the entryway.

The shape seemed to notice him after a moment and he watched transfixed as it raised a hand.

That hand reached out and pulled back the curtain, replacing one fantasy with another. At least, for one brief moment.

“ _Jesper?_ What are you-”

“Welcome to your new workshop!” Jesper announced, smiling brightly as he pulled Klaus inside. “Ta-da!”

Klaus didn’t even have the time to process the sight of Jesper before he was trying to take in what he was saying.

And what he’d done to his old workshop.

He couldn’t get a single word in edgewise as Jesper led him to his chair, talking excitedly over him the whole way.

“You’ll love this, I promise.” Jesper said confidently before revealing a very busy, brightly colored picture with a decorated tree in the middle. “Christmas!”

There was a panic rising in Klaus’ chest.

“Christmas? What do you-”

“Think about it.” Jesper interrupted him. “Every child in town gets up on Christmas morning and finds a-”

He flipped quickly through more and more drawings. Sleeping children, happy children, children reacting excitedly to brightly wrapped gifts.

“Brand new toy waiting for them by the fireplace.” Jesper finished enthusiastically before revealing a picture of the two of them, side-by-side with presents in hand. “We can make the holiday even more magical! Think of the joy, think of the happiness.”

Klaus tried to push past the panic. Maybe this wasn’t going where he’d thought it was going. Or at least, maybe he could talk Jesper out of it before it went any further.

“Jesper, listen. I don’t think-” He started, standing up from his chair.

But Jesper hurried to push him back down.

“Let me finish, let me finish.” He said dismissively before showing yet another picture of happy children, all with presents in their hands. “Think of all those happy little faces, huh?”

Klaus sighed, turning away from the sickly sweet drawing.

“Even if we- Where are you gonna get that many toys?” He asked, finally trying to get to the point. Even if he wasn’t sure he’d like what that point was.

“You,” Jesper said, smiling as he pressed the familiar shape of a wood planer into Klaus’ hand. “Make new ones!”

And there it was, the thing he’d somehow managed to avoid through all of this. Through all the letters and deliveries and time together. The small tool felt impossibly heavy in his hand as once happy memories came flooding back to him.

“I don’t make toys.” He said, every word rough and heavy as he set the planer down. “Not anymore.”

“You have a gift, my friend. Birdhouses are nice and all, but come on!” Jesper persisted cheerfully, reaching out to grab Klaus’ arm. “Those hands were meant for making-”

“I said no.” Klaus told him firmly, pulling his arm back before Jesper could finish that sentence. Why couldn’t he just let this go?

But Jesper continued, just as excited about this idea as he was at the start. Going around the room, trying to show him the possibilities for bringing the old workshop back to life. Completely heedless of Klaus’ continued pleas for him to stop.

He sat, helpless in his own rising distress, until Jesper reached for the tarp that was the one thing standing between him and the reminder of his most painful memories.

“Wait! Don’t touch that!” He called, standing from his chair.

But it was too late.

Jesper finally stopped talking as his eyes fell on the two lonely figures atop the otherwise empty family tree, some small spark of understanding showing as his face fell.

“What’s this?” He asked.

But Klaus barely heard him, his focus completely absorbed by the greatest reminder of his unfulfilled hopes and dreams.

This had gone too far.

“Get out.” He said under his breath.

“Klaus, I’m sorry.” Jesper said. “I didn’t mean-”

“ _Get out!_ ” Klaus repeated louder. Much louder. Louder and harsher than he could remember being in his whole life.

He didn’t look back when Jesper turned to leave.

Didn’t notice the way Jesper stopped to look at him over his shoulder as he left, or the mournful wind that gently blew the door shut once he was gone.

-

That had gone badly. Probably about as badly as it could’ve possibly gone.

Which was funny, because just a few months ago Jesper had literally thought Klaus was as likely to kill him as look at him.

Ok, maybe not so funny. Not “haha” funny, at least.

It was actually a little hard to imagine anything being very funny right now. He almost wished the trip back to the post office was longer. He wasn’t ready to join those last few moments in the workshop up with the rest of his reality.

This time there were only two little figures waiting for him on the porch. One waving enthusiastically at him and greeting him with her best “Hello, Mr. Postman” while the other sat with her head propped up in her hands, stubbornly trying her best to stay awake.

Jesper looked between the two girls.

“You know you don’t have to watch her, right?” He said to Nelly.

“I know.” She said, still sitting there on the steps. Chin in her hands and eyelids drooping.

“She makes it here and then back to wherever she came from on her own without any problems.” Jesper said, taking a seat on the steps beside them. “I think the kid can handle sitting on the porch alone.”

“Her name’s Margu.” Nelly said, eyes drifting closed for a few seconds.

“How’d you figure that out?” He asked.

“Listened.” She told him, managing to get an eye open long enough to give him an unimpressed look. “It wasn’t that hard to figure out in context.”

“Oh.” Jesper said.

No one moved to get up. Margu looked between the two of them like she was waiting for her turn to talk, careful not to interrupt.

“Sophie was calling her that.” Nelly said after a few moments.

“Oh.” Jesper said again.

Then, after it had taken a second to sink in.

“Sophie was talking?”

“Apparently they’ve been having all sorts of conversations.” Nelly said. “I think she likes the way Margu talks better than the way we do.”

Jesper blinked up at the stars.

“Huh.”

After a few moments of silence Nelly suddenly sat up straighter, shifting nervously on the step.

“So,” She said, looking at him from the corner of her eye. “How’s Plan A looking right now?”

“I,” Jesper hesitated, watching her fidget. “I’m still working on it.”

Nelly searched his face, trying to still her hands by holding them tightly together in her lap.

“You’ll tell me if anything changes, won’t you?” She asked.

Jesper looked at her and his already broken heart somehow managed to crack a little more at the fear that was plain on her face.

“I will, I promise.” He lied.

Nelly broke eye-contact and stood up abruptly.

“Thank you.” She said, voice tight, before hurrying inside the post office.

Jesper didn’t look behind him, but he heard the door softly click closed. The sturdy, reliable door that had been made just for him.

He sighed. What was he supposed to do now? He’d been so convinced he had a good idea that he’d jumped in without thinking and hurt his friend. Maybe hurt him enough to have lost him.

Not only had he not solved his own problem, he actually had less than he’d started with. A lot less.

He almost forgot that Margu was still sitting there next to him until she took the silence as her opportunity to talk to him again.

“Still not getting what you want, huh?” Jesper asked after she was done. “I know how that feels. Trust me, I’m right there with you.”

She tilted her head and asked him some kind of question.

“You wanna know what it is I’m not getting?” He asked.

Margu looked at him intently, and Jesper chose to take that as a “yes”.

“Well, I’m not ready to talk to them about it but I guess I could tell you.” He said, leaning back on the steps. “Since you’re apparently such a great person to have a conversation with.”

Margu giggled, then said something that Jesper chose to interpret as concerned.

“It’s just been bothering me, y’know?” He said, completely giving in to the opportunity to vent. “If I don’t get those letters what am I supposed to do? Stay in this little town forever, hanging out with an old woodsman, surrounded by crazy people, and never wanting anything more?”

He sat up and sighed.

“That’s exactly what I told Nelly I’d do.” He continued. “But can I really live like that? Especially if I just ruined everything with-”

He couldn’t bring himself to say it.

“He didn’t deserve- I didn’t mean to-” He tried, faltering over every attempt to get the words out. “Now I just feel like a- I’ve behaved like a-”

Margu jumped in, saying something in an amused tone.

“Precisely.” Jesper said, choosing to take whatever she’d said as the derogatory end to his statement that he clearly deserved.

“And the kids! I promised them-” Jesper stopped short, rubbing his eyes. “I promised them so much before I even knew I could give it to them.”

This had all become something so much bigger than himself and he’d barely even noticed.

“How did things get so complicated? No matter how hard I try I can’t win.” He said. “And I was this time, I really was trying! Maybe not exactly the way I was supposed to. But you can’t say I didn’t put the effort in, right?”

Margu said something short and firm. Whatever it was, she sounded very confident about it.

Jesper looked at her, patiently sitting on the porch with him and listening to complaints she most likely didn’t understand. Waiting for the same thing she waited for every day.

Maybe it was time to put in just a little more of that effort.

“Alright, you win.” He said, standing up. “Let’s go. Follow me.”

-

The walk through town was filled with chatter, the both of them seemed to like talking too much to care about a silly little thing like having no idea what the other person was actually saying.

He didn’t even know if Alva could help, but her job was fifty-percent about knowing stuff and fifty-percent about dealing with kids so he figured it was worth a shot. It also didn’t hurt that she didn’t seem completely unwilling to talk to him anymore, especially with a child as a buffer.

And the lights were still on at the school, so he couldn’t be disturbing her too much.

He looked down at Margu, who seemed to be bubbling over with excitement, before knocking on the door.

He heard Alva call from inside, but they didn’t have to wait long before she answered the door.

And no, it definitely didn’t look like they were disturbing her. Not from sleep at least. She was dressed in a paint-smeared apron, a paintbrush in her hand and a look of surprise on her face.

“Sorry to bother you this late, but by any chance would you happen to understand _this?_ ” Jesper asked, gesturing down to Margu who eagerly supplied an example of what he meant by “this”.

Alva looked between the two of them before taking a step back.

“Ok, come on in.” She said.

Margu hurried in as soon as Alva held the door open wider, quickly disappearing around the corner.

Jesper followed her less enthusiastically, waiting just inside while Alva closed the door behind them.

“What’s going on in here?” He asked as he looked around. It had been a few weeks since he’d last stepped foot in the school, he remembered being surprised at how much just clearing out the fish and rearranging the desks had changed the place. It seemed there was a little more to it now though, if the mess Alva’s apartment was in was anything to go by.

“It’s just temporary.” She said defensively as she tried to push some of the clutter out of sight and make a clearer path to the kitchen.

“Uh huh.” He said distractedly, looking around at the mess. Half painted bookshelves laid out on the floor, stacks of graded schoolwork carefully set aside, and what looked like the remains of a few un-salvageable old school desks propped against the wall.

“Well, are you gonna come in and sit down?” Alva asked, gesturing towards the kitchen. “Or do you have a few more kettles to call black, Mr. Pot?”

“No really, I love what you’ve done with the place.” Jesper grinned. “Looks very lived in. Big difference from before, when it was clearly very died in.”

“Is that really the best you’ve got?” Alva gave him a deadpan stare. “Get in here.”

Jesper walked past her, still clearly amused by his own awful joke.

Margu was already sitting at the table, excitedly swinging her feet and ready to talk Alva’s ear off the moment she entered the room.

Alva laughed, giving the girl a warm smile.

“Ok, who wants hot cocoa?” She asked as Jesper sat down, already pulling out mugs and spoons.

-

By the time he had Margu’s finished letter in his hands Jesper had to admit he was actually feeling a little better. That had been nice. It had been nice to see Margu so excited, to sit and joke and talk to another actual adult.

An adult who wasn’t-

And he was determined to do what he could for Margu, after making her wait for so long.

He had no idea what he was doing, but the memory of her excited face carried him through as he gathered up his best guess at what he would need to make her gift himself.

And he didn’t even have to worry about opening the door with his arms full of wood and cloth and tools when he got back, there was a whole crowd waiting just on the other side to open it for him.

God, he almost missed the days when half of them tried to pretend he didn’t even exist. This whole constantly waiting for him to get back, staring at him all the time thing was getting a little unnerving.

But did he really have room to complain? He had a lot more of this in his future, he’d signed up for it. Very willingly.

He dumped his supplies on the desk, still trying to mentally adjust to his unexpected audience.

“What’d ya get all this for?” Yvette asked, poking at the pile.

“It’s for Margu.” Jesper told her, still trying to go about his business as if they weren’t all there staring at him. “Alva helped me figure out what she was asking for.”

“Did you really not know she wanted a toy?” Nelly asked quietly, side-eyeing the supplies on the desk. “It seemed pretty obvious to me.”

“I knew she wanted a toy!” Jesper said defensively. “She just didn’t have a letter!”

“Stingy.” Yvette said under her breath.

“There is a procedure!” He continued to defend himself firmly.

“You let us ask for a toy without paying postage.” Oskar added.

“But you still wrote a letter.” Jesper said, wheeling around on the boy. “ _Procedure._ ”

“Still stingy.” Yvette muttered again before picking up the wood planer from the desk. “What’s all this supposed to be anyways?”

“Yeah,” Oliver added as he lined the smaller bits of wood and poles out in order of size. “This looks like the kind of stuff Mr. Klaus uses.”

“Why isn’t Mr. Klaus making her toy?” Agnes asked softly as she carefully smoothed out the piece of fabric on the desk.

Jesper felt a lump form in his throat, remembering the reaction he’d gotten when he’d suggested something along those lines.

He stared at the desk for what felt like ages, trying to think of something to tell her.

“Because,” Jesper finally managed to choke out. “Because he doesn’t want to. Now, let me get to work.”

And then there was chaos.

“Let me use this thing! I know how to do the planing! See! I even know what it’s called!”

“Are you gonna paint it? I wanna help with the painting.”

“Me too! I wanna paint!”

They had their hands on everything. Grabbing whatever they could reach, taking things out of each other’s hands, trying to open up pots of paint or guess how the whole thing went together.

Agnes had her little pile completely stolen from her and looked like she was having a very quiet panic attack. Nelly was attempting to confiscate everything from the rest of the kids, which she probably thought was very helpful but was really only starting fights. And all the while Sophie kept slipping things away under the desk while everyone was arguing.

Maybe Klaus could handle all this, a dozen little hands getting into everything and kids not waiting for either permission or instructions, but Jesper couldn’t. Not tonight.

And just thinking of Klaus patiently showing them what to do, giving them each some small job to keep them occupied, left an aching hole in his chest.

“No. No no no.” He said over them all, taking tools and scraps of wood out of little hands. “Not looking for any help tonight.”

“Come on!” Yvette whined. “We know what we’re doing!”

“Yeah,” Joelle added, pouting. “Mr. Klaus showed us how to do all this stuff.”

“Please,” He begged, wishing they would just forget that name for one night. “Just go to bed.”

The whining started immediately. A whole sampler platter of angry and sad and worried tones.

“This isn’t about if I can or can’t tell you what to do.” He cut them off, voice softening as the room grew quiet again. “Could you just do it because I asked? As a favor to me?”

He wasn’t sure what it was, maybe he just looked pathetic enough to garner a little pity, but they listened to him. Pots of paint were set down, tools were carefully laid back on the desk, and each of them wished him a quiet goodnight before heading upstairs. Worried looks lingering on him before they disappeared from sight.

Nelly lingered behind on the staircase the longest.

“Are we on Plan A or Plan B right now?” She asked, her usual controlled facade slipping and showing the lost little girl underneath.

“I don’t know.” Jesper said plainly, doing his best to hold himself together. “Just let me do this for Margu right now. Ok? I’ll worry about us tomorrow. Just- Just let me focus on this for now.”

She sat down on the step, her expression tightening into a sour frown. He could practically hear the gears turning in her head.

“This isn’t a problem that you have to fix.” He told her. “Let me take care of things. Whatever happens, I’ll take care of it.”

“Ok.” She said, like it was the single hardest word she’d ever spoken.

“Thanks.” Jesper felt some small sense of relief as he watched her climb the rest of the way up the stairs. “Goodnight.”

He heard “Goodnight, Dad.” Barely above a whisper, followed by hurried footsteps and then silence.

Jesper let out a long weary sigh before getting started on exactly what he’d said he’d do; put all his focus on Margu and her toy, and leave worrying about everything else for later.

-

Klaus wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting when he’d brought himself down to the post office, wasn’t even sure what he thought he was going to do once he got there.

Apologize? Maybe. But the words to do so still hadn’t come to him.

Did he want an apology? A part of him did. But a bigger part of him didn’t want to talk about it at all.

But that bigger part had been overruled by the part of him that couldn’t stand the idea that he may never see Jesper again. No matter how much the postman had upset him, that thought had been too much to bear.

He wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting. But it wasn’t Jesper slumped over the desk, snoring amidst the sad attempt at some amateur woodwork.

Klaus watched the rise and fall of Jesper’s back, silently wondering if he should really be there at all before he noticed the open letter laying next to his face.

He picked it up and sighed heavily before he’d even finished reading it. So that’s what Jesper had been trying to do.

Klaus looked from the letter to Jesper’s sleeping face and almost felt the decision he was about to make form itself. Something shifting inside him like old earth being turned for the first time in years.

Well, at least this was something he knew how to do.

He was still processing what it was he was letting himself do, the steady motion of the planer smoothing the wood helping his thoughts fall back into order.

He could see Jesper sit up from the corner of his eye and his chest tightened, but he didn’t look up before placing the other planer in front of him.

He was relieved when Jesper took it silently and the sound of wood being scraped was doubled.

Jesper opened his mouth, his unspoken apology written all over his face. But before he’d managed to say anything beyond his name Klaus held a hand up, silencing him without a word before pointing back own at the work in front of them.

The only thing he saw of Jesper were his hands working steadily back and forth, mimicking his own. This definitely wasn’t what he’d come here to do, but it did more to sooth his guilt and anger and sadness than any words could have.

Klaus finally looked up once they were ready to move onto to the next steps in constructing Margu’s little iceboat, and when he did he saw Jesper was smiling at him with far more open softness than he could handle right now.

He looked back down, trying to pull his thoughts back to the raw materials in front of him. The start of a new toy.

“Ok, I’ll start carving the runners and you can work on making a cleaner hole to attach the mast to.” He said, handing Jesper the hand drill. “Can you handle that?”

Jesper was still looking at him intently as he took the tool. “Yeah, I can do that.”

The silence had been broken, but to Klaus’ relief most of the talk revolved around the construction of the iceboat.

Jesper seemed nervous to ask him questions at first, trying to work things out on his own until Klaus noticed him struggling to keep the hand drill steady and took his hands to show him how to hold it and what it felt like when you had the right rhythm.

The atmosphere changed into something easier as things began taking shape. Questions and instructions gave way to scattered conversation and quiet laughter.

They were nearly done and Klaus took a moment away from carefully attaching the tiny sail to the mast to look at Jesper.

He was sitting on the floor with sawdust in his hair, fully focused on painting the finished body of the iceboat.

“You’re really good at that.” Klaus said, watching Jesper work.

“Huh?” Jesper looked up, startled. “Oh. The compliments on my artistic abilities just keep rolling in. My Mom would be so proud.”

Klaus wasn’t sure what all that meant, but Jesper seemed amused so he chuckled.

They tried to stay quiet, but the two of them were so caught up in their work and in each other that they didn’t notice the little audience they’d gained.

The little audience that were also doing their best to stay quiet as they pushed each other out of the way for a better look, nervously watching cold silence turn into smiles and laughter.

Jesper and Klaus had become so caught up in each other, they didn’t even notice the sound of rushed little footsteps on the stairs when they had Margu’s gift all wrapped and ready to go.

-

Thankfully on that night, just like most other nights, Mogens wasn’t particularly busy.

The ferry was docked and ready to go, all they needed was the ferryman.

Klaus knocked cautiously on the door of the boathouse. When that got no response Jesper stepped up and gave a few good solid hits that echoed loudly up and down the pier.

Still nothing.

Klaus gave Jesper a puzzled look, which was when Jesper realized he’d never actually seen the ferryman so much as glance at the old boathouse.

“Wait here.” He said before gingerly climbing onto the back of the ferry.

He looked around for a moment and then stomped the deck with the same solid rhythm he’d knocked on the door with.

There was a rustling from below deck, followed by some excited skittering. The nearly invisible hatch squeaked open just enough for a pointy, whiskered nose to poke through and curiously sniff the night air, quickly followed by the rest of the fearless little ferret.

Jesper looked down as Reginald sniffed at his boots but was quickly distracted by an unmistakably threatening voice coming from the open hatch.

“I don’t know what made you think this’d be a fun way to spend yer night but unless yer fond of- Oh, it’s you.”

Mogens whole demeanor changed when he spotted Jesper, and he slipped whatever it was he’d just had in his hand into a pocket. Jesper couldn’t make out what it was in the dark, but suddenly he wasn’t feeling so great about standing up there on the ferry.

“What’cha doin’ out here at this hour?” Mogens asked, looking between Jesper and Klaus as he reached down to scoop Reginald up before the ferret could go off and inspect the situation for himself.

“We were wondering if you could take us and, uh, that” He said, pointing at the sleigh. “On a quick trip.”

Mogens gave the sleigh and all the reindeer a quick once over before sticking Reginald into an inner pocket of his coat. As if that was a normal thing to do.

“Yeah, she can handle that.” He said. “Go ahead and load her up.”

Jesper rolled his eyes. He really shouldn’t have been expecting Mogens to help with their cargo. He tried to let it go as he helped Klaus push the sleigh onto the ferry and Mogens began preparing to depart.

Jesper saw the line under his foot pulled taut, but not in time to step away from it. He stumbled, losing his grip on the back of the sleigh.

It really wasn’t too bad of a trip, but before he even had the chance to catch himself he felt a large hand flat against his chest.

“Are you alright?” Klaus asked, steadying Jesper on his feet before pulling his hand back.

“I- Yeah.” Jesper faltered, still feeling the warm outline of that hand on his chest. “Yeah, I’m fine. Thanks.”

Klaus finished loading the sleigh and the reindeer onto the ferry himself and Jesper noticed Mogens had stopped what he was doing with the lines to stare at the man.

“Well, guess I had you pegged wrong. Looks like I might owe you an apology for the other day with Alva.” Mogens said, turning his attention to Jesper and pointedly _not_ apologizing.

Jesper narrowed his eyes.

“What are you talking about?” He hissed under his breath.

“It was an obvious mistake, really.” Mogens continued, making no effort to match Jesper’s lowered volume. “Got too caught up in the chance for a joke, didn’t notice what was right in front of me.”

“Hmm, yes. That’s cleared everything up. Thank you.” Jesper said. “Now, do you have any other cryptic remarks to make? Or are you ready to drive the boat?”

“I’m gettin’ to it. Just thought I’d offer my congratulations first.” He said as he walked past Jesper and up towards the helm. “Would’ve thought the old man had higher standards, but I guess ya can’t be too picky livin’ out in the woods like that.”

Jesper furrowed his brow but couldn’t bring himself to yell after the ferryman as the distance between them grew. It didn’t feel like the kind of discussion he wanted to involve raised voices in. He took a deep breath and went to sit with Klaus.

“Everything alright?” Klaus asked, looking cautiously up to Mogens at the helm.

“Yeah, it’s fine.” Jesper told him, shaking his head. “He’s just _being Mogens_.”

Klaus made a short, unconvinced noise but Jesper was grateful when the subject didn’t come up again. In fact, he almost forgot Mogens was even there as he and Klaus slipped into the kind of easy conversation he’d become accustomed to and had only a few hours ago thought he’d lost forever.

The snow and wind had picked up by the time they landed at their destination, visibility was low but there was no question if they would continue on or not.

Jesper had become very familiar with the different phases of night and though all evidence pointed to it still being a good while until sunrise he still looked anxiously over their map and the rudimentary directions Margu had included in her letter, nervous that they wouldn’t make it to her in time.

He was so engrossed that he didn’t notice the tents rising over the horizon until Klaus nudged him in the side as the reindeer slowed their gait.

Jesper’s heart was beating hard in his chest as they carefully leaned the wrapped present against the tent Margu had described before rushing to hide behind a snowbank and wait for dawn.

When Margu finally peaked her head out into the morning light Jesper found himself almost subconsciously reaching for Klaus’ arm and the two of them practically held their breath as the girl discovered her gift.

Jesper watched her share the excitement of her discovery with her parents, the purest sense of joy filling his heart as she sailed across the ice with her father’s help. Laughing and yelling excitedly as her mother looked on.

Even in the freezing snow, exhausted and even farther from home than before, he couldn’t imagine a more perfect moment of happiness.

Until he felt a heavy hand on his back and saw Klaus smiling at him, as warm and bright as the sun. He let himself lean into the contentment that smile radiated, feeling warmer in that moment than he had all year.

-

Klaus watched as Jesper finished tending the reindeer, he’d jumped into the chore with far more enthusiasm than he normally would. The same enthusiasm he’d been pouring into talking from the moment they’d set foot back in Smeerensburg and put the ferry behind them.

And Jesper had been doing a lot of talking.

Not that Klaus was complaining, it gave him an excellent opportunity just to watch him. Watch him smile and gush about seeing Margu so happy with the little iceboat they’d made for her. Made for her together.

“And she loved it, Right? I think she did. Do you think she loved it?” Jesper asked.

“I do.” Klaus said, eyes fixed on Jesper.

“Yeah, me too. Me too. Yeah, she loved it.”

If he’d had any doubts about the strength and nature of his feelings for this man before, they were long gone now.

It had been a long time since he’d felt this happy. A long time since he’d felt free to enjoy it. A very long time.

“You know, I remember the day I first had that very same smile on my face.” He said, unable to deny how much that day felt like this one.

“What? What smile? I wasn’t smiling.” Jesper protested, smile never leaving his face. “I was squinting. From the sun.”

“Right. I didn’t want to admit it at first either. She used to tease me about it.”

“She?” Jesper asked, face finally falling.

But Klaus didn’t let that deter him. He’d made up his mind. He wanted Jesper to know this.

“My Lydia.” He said, and there was a certain sense of relief just in saying her name. Saying it out loud to another human being after keeping all his pains and joys to himself for so long. And something terribly intimate in saying it to Jesper.

“I remember when I found this spot in the woods that she loved.” He continued, stepping into the workshop. “And I built us a house, right here. Away from it all. But it wasn’t going to be the two of us for long.”

Klaus stood in front of that empty family tree, the one part of his old life that had been too painful to even look at, and found himself smiling.

“We wanted children.” He said. “Lots of them. Running around, laughing, getting in trouble.”

Duel images ran through his head.

Images of hopeful days with Lydia, making toys and imagining the little ones who might someday play with them.

And images of Jesper. Jesper and the kids. Playing and roughhousing and screeching in the snow. Jesper by the fire with the kids asleep all around him.

“While we waited, I started making toys for them. And we waited, and I kept making toys and more toys. And we kept waiting, but they never came.” Klaus turned from the empty tree and stepped back outside into the open air. It wasn’t easy to talk about, but somehow the words kept coming. “And then, she got sick. Even now, sometimes, it almost feels like she’s still-”

He paused, the joy of remembering his time with Lydia and realizing he could feel even a little bit of that again fading back into the sadness he’d become all too familiar with.

“After she was gone, I guess I got lost. She loved birds, so I just kept making birdhouses.” He felt the tears well up in his eyes, but still he managed to turn to Jesper with a smile. “But then, then you showed up. Delivering these toys, seeing the joy they bring to children, having this lonely old place filled with children’s laughter. I thought I’d never feel this again. And I have you to thank for it, my friend. So, thank you. You’ve given me more than you can possibly know.”

Klaus placed a hand on Jesper’s shoulder, squeezing it slightly. Not daring to do more than that, no matter how desperately he wanted to embrace him, scared he might never be able to let him go.

“Of course.” Jesper said quietly, looking down at the hand on his shoulder.

Klaus looked at him for a moment, the man who had actually managed to make him happy again after all these years, and made a decision.

“Hey, you know what? We’re doing it!” He said excitedly.

“What? Doing what?” Jesper faltered.

“The Christmas thing! We’re making all those toys! That’s what she would’ve wanted.” Klaus continued. And, as impossible as it seemed after so long, it was what he wanted. It really was.

“Really?” Jesper asked.

“Yeah, really!” Klaus told him, completely un-phased by Jesper’s lack of enthusiasm. “And with a whole year of planning, we can expand to more villages next year.”

“Next year?”

“And more the year after that!”

“But I won’t-” Jesper said, desperately struggling for the right words. “I mean, who knows what’s gonna happen next year? I might not even-”

“What’re you going on about? Let’s go! No time to lose!” Klaus said as he stepped back inside the workshop, full of ideas and hope and excitement.

So much excitement that he dismissed the obvious hesitation in Jesper’s voice, missed the way his face fell as soon as Klaus wasn’t looking at him anymore. Missed every sign that Jesper was struggling with something he still wasn’t ready to tell him about.

-

Jesper made his way back into town in a haze.

He should be happy now. He might actually get the rest of those letters. He could go home, he could take the kids home.

He should be happy, but he wasn’t.

He could still hear Klaus’ words ringing in his ears.

_“We wanted children. Lots of them. Running around, laughing, getting into trouble.”_

It almost didn’t feel real. Klaus and his poor Lydia had waited and waited for kids that never showed up.

And then he’d just arrived one day with a whole gaggle of them, long after she was gone, as if he were making the most cosmically ironic delivery in history.

Did someone order some kids? Lots of them? Heavy on the ‘getting into trouble’?

God, what was he taking from Klaus if he actually left with the kids?

He tried to imagine leaving, packing what little they had up and watching the island get smaller and smaller from the back of the ferry.

It had been exciting to think about not that long ago. And even before the kids had gotten involved, imagining putting this place behind him had gotten him through a lot of hard days.

But now the thought of watching Smeerensburg disappear over the horizon filled him with dread. Dread and loneliness.

What was different now? What had changed?

He closed his eyes and saw Klaus’ smiling face, almost felt his hand on his shoulder again.

But that couldn’t be it. How could one man be worth leaving behind his whole life? The money and ease, the prominence that came with being the Postmaster General’s son and heir to two wealthy respectable families.

What was worth giving all that up for? What could possibly make staying in a place like Smeerensburg worth it?

Jesper sighed as the post office came into view, a tiny lone little figure sitting on the front steps and staring off into the distance.

He looked around the quiet, empty yard.

“You all alone today, huh?” He asked, looking back at Sophie sitting alone on the porch. “Guess Margu wasn’t very interested in showing off her present.”

Sophie’s eyes lit up briefly at the mention of her friend’s name but she seemed to realize rather quickly that Jesper didn’t have anything else to say worth listening to and she resumed intently staring off into the distance.

“Hey. Sorry, mouse.” Jesper said crouching down to look her in the eye, though she just craned her neck to look around him. “Didn’t mean to give your friend a distraction from coming to play with you.”

Sophie grumbled at the empty horizon before looking up at him with a pout.

“Why don’t we go see how everyone else is doing?” He asked her. “School should be over soon and it beats sitting out here feeling sorry for ourselves.”

She didn’t need much convincing. Sophie reached her arms out to him a soon as he stood up and buried her chilly face in his scarf when he obliged and picked her up.

School was very much still in session, he could hear singing from half way down the street and Sophie even poked her head back up at the sound of it.

Jesper shifted the girl to one arm and used the other to open the schoolhouse door as quietly as he could.

The happy singing children were no surprise, but the schoolhouse itself was almost unrecognizable. Alva had made it functional before. Getting rid of the fish, getting the desks in order, taking the knives out of the globe. But now it looked like, well, a school.

Jesper stood in the back of the room, just taking it all in and keeping Sophie from touching everything until Alva announced the end of class.

Most of the other children ran out past him as if he wasn’t even there. A few of them yelled a quick “Hi, Mr. Postman” at him on their way out and he heard one distinct “Hi, Mr. Joelle’s Dad” that had him turning on the spot to see who had said it, but they were already gone.

All of his kids had decided to stick around though, crowding around him or lingering by the door impatiently. Almost as if they were waiting for something. Waiting for him?

He set Sophie down, deciding to let that be for now, and turned his attention to Alva.

“What happened here?”

“Hmm?” Alva had the gall to try and give him an innocent look. “Oh, this? I just thought the place could use a little cleaning up. Looks good, right?”

“A little cleaning up?” He asked. “What you did before was ‘a little cleaning up’, this is- This is definitely not a ‘little’ anything! How did you afford all this?”

Instead of just answering him she tried to turn that unconvincing innocent look up to eleven.

“Wait. Your savings?” Jesper asked in disbelief.

“Well, what else was I gonna use it for?” Alva asked with a dismissive shrug.

“What happened to moving far far away from here?” He asked her, gesturing around the schoolroom in confusion.

“Someone would have to be pretty stupid to want to leave this place now.” Alva said, turning back to him with a smile.

“Well, I mean-” He started.

But he was interrupted from his conversation with Alva by an incessant tugging at his sleeve and a steadily repeated mantra of “Dad, Dad, Dad” in a forced whisper.

“What?” Jesper asked, giving up on what he’d been trying to say and looking down at Joelle.

“Are we going to see Mr. Klaus today?” She asked, looking up at him hopefully.

Jesper rubbed his face.

“No, no we’re not.” He said. “Not today. He’s getting some stuff together right now. We’ll go see him tomorrow.”

“Oh.” Joelle said, clearly disappointed.

Jesper turned back to Alva, who had an inexplicable smirk on her face.

“Ok.” He said. “Now, what were we talking about?”

“Y’know what,” Alva said, looking between him and the kids. “Why don’t I just show you.”

Before he could react to that Alva was headed towards the door, reminding all the kids to put their coats on before she stepped outside and started towards the center of town.

Nelly and Oliver looked between the two adults uncertainly but most of the children followed after their teacher without hesitation, Agnes easily slipping her hand into Alva’s as they walked.

Jesper watched them go for a brief, confused moment before scooping Sophie up and hurrying after them.

The other stragglers quickly caught up with him as Alva lead them through the streets, and as they walked he noticed they weren’t the only ones headed in that specific direction. All the foot traffic in town seemed to be flowing towards the same singular point.

When they stepped through the arch into the town square Jesper was speechless. He didn’t even notice Alva looking back over her shoulder to see his reaction.

He’d thought he’d had a good grasp on how things had been changing in Smeerensburg, but the hordes of children happily playing together in his front yard had not prepared him for all this.

There was music and lights and stalls selling everything from hand pies to hot cider. Krums and Ellingboes mingled easily in the streets, children waved at him as they ran by, people greeted him by name.

It was a far cry from the Smeerensburg he’d first arrived in all those months ago.

As they passed by the stalls lining the streets people called out their wares, offering fresh baked goods and hot drinks. Jesper was so busy marveling at the rest of the transformed town around him he barely noticed them, until he realized that one woman was speaking to them directly.

He’d missed what she’d said but clearly the sweets she had for sale had caught the eye of more than one of the kids, Agnes and Joelle specifically nearly getting left behind as they stared at the display.

“Can we? Please?” Agnes asked, looking up at him hopefully.

Jesper looked down at the assortment of little cakes and pastries, all shining with bright red jam in the center or dusted with fine white sugar.

“I don’t know that we can afford all that.” He told her uneasily.

“Oh, nonsense.” Said the woman behind the stall cheerfully. “Don’t worry about the money! Go ahead and take one each. Pick whatever you like.”

The kids all crowded around the stall, buzzing with excitement as they each chose a sweet and waited eagerly for it to be handed to them.

“It’s so sweet!” Joelle exclaimed happily through a mouth full of cake and jam.

As everyone ate, red jam and white sugar getting all over their hands and face and clothes, another group of children yelled at them as they passed by. Jesper couldn’t even make out was being said between all the excited overlapping voices but suddenly his kids were running after their friends, most of them still shoving cake into their faces.

“See ya later, Dad.” Yvette yelled with her mouth full, turning back to wave at him.

Before Jesper could yell after the quickly dispersing children, reprimanding them for not saying thank you and running with their mouths full, his hand was suddenly grabbed. The woman selling sweets held it between both of her own as she pressed another jelly filled pastry into his palm.

“And one for our hardworking postman.” She said, smiling warmly at him.

Jesper stared at her, this small moment of generosity leaving him utterly speechless.

Alva came up beside him, showing a certain level of comfortable familiarity with the woman. They struck up a friendly conversation as Alva was invited to pick her own free treat.

As he distractedly listened to the sounds of the two women talking casually and laughing over something or other going on in town that he’d also managed to be completely unaware of, Jesper took a bite of his small pastry.

It was sweet, almost painfully so. Even with a few pilfered cookies here and there, Jesper couldn’t remember the last time he’d tasted something this sweet. He felt tears welling up in the corners of his eyes before he’d even processed that he was feeling something.

Don’t cry over some decent food, he thought to himself. Not again. What’s happened to you?

If Alva noticed anything off with him when she had finished her conversation, she was polite enough not to say anything about it. She pulled him along, her own free pastry in hand, to show him more of what the good people of Smeerensburg had gotten up to lately.

And it was amazing. He could hardly take it all in. Just the fact that everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves was almost too surreal.

They stopped at the top of a bridge, leaning on the railing and looking down at people skating on the frozen inlet. And god, they’d even decorated those old whale bones. Somehow that seemed like a very Smeerensburg thing to do.

“Not exactly the same place, is it?” Alva asked.

No, no it wasn’t. Jesper could see that much. But as wonderful as it all was, something about the town’s joy had his insides all tied up in knots. Was this really all from what he’d done? What he and Klaus had done?

“You know, it really is great what you’re doing for those kids.” Alva said suddenly, still looking out over the ice. “Wasn’t sure how that whole cohabiting situation would turn out, but I’m glad they’ve got you looking out for them. It can be hard growing up thinking you’re all on your own, I don’t know what I would’ve done at that age if I hadn’t had the Sisters at St. Catherine’s.”

“Oh, it’s nothing. I mean, not nothing. Definitely not nothing. But it’s not exactly what I planned to-” Jesper paused, frowning. “Wait, hold on. Are you saying you-”

“Grew up in an orphanage?” Alva finished for him, smirking at his concerned look. “Oh, don’t look at me like that. It wasn’t so bad. Like I said, I had people looking out for me. Even got a decent education out of it!”

Alva’s smirk shifted into something softer.

“It’s good, after all these years, to see people looking out for each other.” She said. “Looking out for more than just their own flesh and blood.”

Jesper looked down, watching the figures skate across the ice.

“Yeah, it’s nice.” He said quietly.

“Hey, what’s the matter with you?” Alva asked, looking at him.

“What?” Jesper asked, startled by her close inspection. “It’s nothing. I’m fine. This is all really nice. I’m just surprised.”

“Uh huh.” Alva said slowly, tone doubtful. “Right, surprised. That’s why you look like a kicked puppy. You’re surprised.”

Jesper narrowed his eyes at her.

“Ok, maybe I’m not just surprised.” He said. “Maybe I’ve also got a lot on my mind right now.”

“Yeah? Like what?” She asked, leaning against the railing and watching him with an inquisitive eye.

Jesper watched her warily, ready to tell her it was none of her business if he couldn’t think of a lie fast enough. But what did it actually matter? He had a lot at stake with Klaus but what did he have to lose telling Alva some sliver of the truth?

“Ok, so,” Jesper started, finally breaking eye contact and taking his hat off as he spoke. “This was actually only supposed to be a temporary assignment for me. Just one year, and that year’s almost up. I wasn’t planning on being here after the new year. I still don’t plan on being here if I can help it.”

Alva frowned.

“And don’t worry about the kids, this isn’t about the kids. The kids are covered. Doing great with the kids.” Jesper rushed to tell her before she could even open her mouth.

“I’m still sensing a ‘but’ here.” She said.

“ _But_ I’ve actually gotten really close with someone and it’s been really nice spending time together and he’s been talking about all the things we might do together in the future and I’m not even supposed to be here for it!” Jesper wrung his hat in his hands, looking off into the distance. “But I never even said I’d be staying after this year in the first place and he’s really nice and probably wouldn’t even get mad at me for leaving. Not openly at least.”

"Well then what are you worried about?" Alva asked.

"I don't know!" Jesper exclaimed, running a hand distractedly through his hair. "Hurting his feelings, I guess."

"You guess?"

"And it's so weird because usually if I start worrying about someone else's feelings I'm fine just ditching whatever space we shared and never seeing them again." He continued, almost completely to himself. "But I'm not ok with that this time."

"Where exactly were you planning to go?" Alva asked slowly.

"Huh?" Jesper looked at her in confusion.

"I mean, do you have to leave? Can't you just keep this assignment and, y'know, let yourself actually worry about someone else's feelings for once?" She asked, distractedly picking at her own pastry.

“You make it sound so easy.” He said. “Especially for someone who spent years only looking out for herself.”

“Well maybe that’s because once I started caring about other people again I remembered how easy it is. But I’ve always been a fast learner.” She said, elbowing him playfully.

Jesper tried to return her smile but he could feel it wasn’t his best effort. She really did make it sound so simple, so easy. He wasn’t sure putting someone else’s feelings first would come quite as naturally to him.

Especially because it wasn’t just one someone else’s feelings he was worried about. It was one big someone else’s feelings and a lot of little someone else’s feelings and he wasn’t sure he was ready to handle all that.

-

Nelly looked up from her book at the sound of the workbench thunking hard against the floor. She’d been looking up at the sound of the workbench thunking against the floor about once every five minutes.

Jesper and Klaus had been trying to move that one piece of furniture up the stairs for the better part of an hour now. Before the thunking had started it was the almost-argument they’d had about where to move it in the first place that had distracted her from her reading.

An argument that ended very abruptly when Jesper had realized he hadn’t actually understood anything Klaus had told him and maybe that disqualified him from having much of an opinion.

Nelly had snorted at that. Not that Jesper could prove it. Not when she was so _clearly_ immersed in the most recent book that Alva had loaned her.

She was very grateful for that book, as hard as she was finding it to focus on actually reading it. It was very useful for hiding behind. Hiding her amusement at Jesper’s fumbling as well as the more genuine smiles that she couldn’t keep off her traitorous face.

As nice as Jesper had made the big city and all those fancy expensive things sound, she was starting to wonder if maybe Plan B was actually the better plan.

And as much as she didn’t want to get her hopes up, she couldn’t help but enjoy the way this all felt. She didn’t dare name it, not even to herself, but it felt secure. Felt safe. Felt like what she’d always imagined home was supposed to feel like.

The kind of home she didn’t think was real. A home with people who didn’t ignore you or throw you out, even when you really did mess up, and grown ups who told you not to worry because they’d make sure everything was ok.

Right there, right in that moment. With both Klaus and Jesper, working together, smiling at each other (especially when they thought the other one wasn’t looking at them).

Agnes trailing behind one or both of them, doing any little thing that might generously be considered “helping”.

Sophie slowly chasing Chekhov around the room. The poor cat moving from sunny spot to sunny spot every time the girl caught up to him to pull on his tail or try to bite his ear.

And that little bit of added chaos that came with everyone else deciding that playing tag indoors was somehow a good idea right now.

Jesper gasped when Yvette ducked under him as he and Klaus tried to lift the workbench again.

“Hey!” He yelled after her as she continued running. “You can’t play like that in here if you can’t watch where you’re going!”

“Sorry, Dad!” She yelled back in a tone that very clearly said she hadn’t actually listened and just hoped “sorry” was the right thing to say.

There was a long pause. Nelly looked up again.

“So, ‘Dad’. That’s new?” Klaus said questioningly, rubbing the back of his head as he watched the other kids run in circles. “Guess they’re not ‘little monsters’ anymore.”

“Oh no, they’re still little monsters.” Jesper laughed. “They’re just _my_ little monsters now.”

And Nelly had to hide behind her book again. Jesper was not allowed to know how that made her smile. She’d die of embarrassment.

Before another fruitless attempt to move the heavy workbench up the stairs could begin there was a knock at the door. There was a shared moment of silent confusion around the room before Jesper said he’d get it.

Of course, even a simple trip across the room couldn’t go without incident. Jesper nearly landed face first on the floor, tripping over Oskar as the boy ran straight in front of him as if he wasn’t even there.

“That’s it.” Jesper said, firmly enough that the running actually came to a halt. “You need to take this outside.”

“What? But why?” Joelle whined. “We wanna stay in here! Don’t kick us out!”

“I wouldn’t have a problem with you being in here right now.” Jesper said, gesturing around the workshop. “If you could actually stay out of the way!”

“We’re not in the way!” Oskar cried behind him.

“I just stepped on you!” Jesper exclaimed as he went to answer the door. “You literally couldn’t be more underfoot!”

Jesper went quiet as he opened the door and Nelly looked up when she heard a familiar voice. A familiar voice that had Sophie excitedly bolting across the room.

“Hey there.” Jesper said warmly, and Nelly could see he had Margu in his arms. She seemed quite happy to be there. Even with Sophie at Jesper’s feet making grabby motions with her hands, demanding that her friend be put back down.

And before she could even be properly surprised at the other girl’s presence a whole crowd of unknown adults came pouring into the workshop, dozens of them. Nelly snapped her book shut and backed up against the wall, moving along it until she was half behind Jesper. He looked down at her with a raised eyebrow, but didn’t say anything.

Jesper and Klaus watched these new adults pour in with matching looks of confusion until Klaus smiled.

“A true act of goodwill always sparks another.” He said, clasping Jesper on the shoulder. “Never fails.”

-

The whole atmosphere of the workshop seemed to change with the help that had been welcomely forced upon them. It wasn’t just the mess and dust getting cleaned up a little faster, the whole place seemed to come to life.

The fact that they could barely understand more than a few words between them didn’t seem to be much of an obstacle. The workshop was full of laughter and music, the kids organized games with all their new friends, and Klaus seemed to have slipped into a leadership role with surprising ease.

It was nice.

Jesper didn’t even realize how much his own mood had improved until he found himself rushing to pick the kids up from school the next day before going back to the workshop for a long weekend.

“What’s got you so chipper all of a sudden?” Alva said as he hurried the kids out the door. “Where’d that kicked puppy from the other night go?”

“Huh?” Jesper asked distractedly. “Oh, it’s nothing.”

“Yeah, for some reason I have a hard time believing it’s nothing.” She said, watching Joelle and Oskar try to drag him out the door.

Jesper looked at her, one of the few people in this town he could even consider calling a friend, and made a split second decision.

“Y’know what? Why don’t you come with us and I’ll show you?”

Alva looked stunned but went with them, easily persuaded by her own curiosity and no small amount of excitement from the kids.

Jesper did his best to fill her in on the aftermath of Margu’s letter, with lots of input from the kids of varying levels of coherency and helpfulness, but he could tell as soon as they stepped into the workshop that it was still much more than she’d been expecting.

From all the people busy cleaning or moving furniture or making toys to the few dozen extra kids running around to Klaus himself, who greeted her cheerfully even though he’d had no idea she was coming. She took it all in with quiet wonder.

Not that she didn’t adapt quickly, especially with all the kids running around. In fact, Alva had quickly made herself something of a co-conspirator in the unbridled chaos the kids added to the workshop’s atmosphere.

Every kid in the workshop seemed to rapidly bounce back and forth between wanting to run rampant, playing with no concern for what was going on around them, and wanting very earnestly to help the grown-ups with their work.

Jesper thought he had Alva as an ally in finding the helpful-minded kids something they could do, but he quickly realized she was intentionally encouraging them to do the exact opposite of what he said every time he turned his back.

Mostly he realized this because the kids couldn’t keep themselves from laughing every time he tried to give them instructions.

“Hey! I’m in charge here! Listen to me!” Jesper told them. “If you don’t start listening to me I’ll just leave!”

“Did you hear that?” Alva said to the kids in a loud stage whisper. “He promised to leave if we stop listening to him.”

“That’s a lie!” Yvette told her, very loudly. “I haven’t been listenin’ to him for months and he’s still here!”

Alva laughed long and hard at that and the kids followed suit, but before Jesper could say another word on the subject he had a hand on his elbow.

Margu’s father seemed to be looking to get approval for something they were working on and after a short confused discussion Jesper had to give up and direct the man to Klaus, who was already working with someone else on the other side of the room.

When he found Alva again she was sitting on the steps, surrounded in equal parts by Saami children and a few of his kids, giving an impromptu language lesson. A lesson which was frequently interrupted by laughter and some of the older Saami kids trying to correct her pronunciation.

Alva seemed completely in her element, giving out praise and encouragement and not afraid to laugh at her own mistakes. Jesper almost felt jealous of how easily she’d found a place in all this.

But before the feeling could really settle in he suddenly had his attention called on by a young Saami woman who started out talking to him very quickly and then slowed down, realizing he hadn’t understood a word. She did her best to speak as much with gestures as with words, but that didn’t help him understand anything beyond the fact that she was asking a question. Possibly several.

And then Oliver was at his elbow asking if he could stay with him for a little bit because it was just too loud over there with everyone else.

And then Klaus was asking for his opinion on something Jesper understood so little about that he couldn’t even picture what he was talking about, but Klaus seemed to care what he thought so he picked Completely Incomprehensible Option A and felt relieved when Klaus smiled.

By the time he turned back to the woman who’d first tried to talk to him she’d been pulled away by one of the other children and was now sitting on the stairs next to Alva, giving a little language lesson of her own.

The two women were looking very intently at each other as Alva tried to follow each word being carefully pronounced syllable by syllable. She still seemed to get something wrong when she tried to string it all together, but that just led to more laughter. The Saami woman shaking her head with a hand on Alva’s shoulder, laughing too hard to correct her, and Alva covering her bright red face with one hand even as she smiled wide.

The days went on like that, each one seeming to have it’s own special way of pushing the thought of leaving further and further from his mind. Things that made him happy to just be in the moment, working together with Klaus and their new friends and not worrying about his own plans for a little while.

When Klaus had shown him the new sleigh, sturdy and beautiful with their names carved side by side, he felt for the first time that maybe he’d ended up exactly where he was supposed to be. That he had a place.

And when they showed Klaus all the new figures they’d made for the family tree, their Saami friends and Alva filling the cubbies and spilling out onto the roots, him and the kids all squeezed in right below where Klaus and Lydia had stood alone for so many years, he hoped he’d helped Klaus feel some of that belonging too.

-

Eventually the noise and bustle of the workshop died down again and Jesper was left sitting by the fireplace with Sophie fast asleep in his lap and Alva sitting in the chair across from him, nursing a cup of coffee.

The last of their friends were finishing up their work or gathering up their own children and slowly filtering out for the night.

Klaus had gone to get the rest of the kids settled in over at the house but stepped back into the workshop just in time to wish Margu and her parents goodnight on their way out.

“Well, at least one of them is actually asleep.” Klaus joked as he walked in, smiling warmly at Sophie fast asleep in Jesper’s arms.

“Yeah, good luck with the rest of them over there.” Jesper told him. “You’re gonna need it.”

“I can handle it.” Klaus said, turning that smile on Jesper.

“If you say so. I’m already ahead of you by one.” He said, looking down at Sophie’s head resting on his chest. “And all it took was being stuck in this chair for about two hours. Easy stuff.”

“Here, let me take her.” Klaus said, already reaching to pick the small girl up.

“Oh, thanks.” Jesper said, smiling up at Klaus as he carefully scooped Sophie out of his lap.

“Goodnight, Jesper.” Klaus said, pausing to look over his shoulder one last time before leaving the workshop for the night.

Jesper smiled. “Goodnight, Klaus.”

As the door closed he noticed Alva looking at him, an inexplicably _knowing_ smile on her face.

“What?” Jesper asked.

“You two are cute.” She said.

Jesper frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Y’know,” She said gesturing to the door. “You and Klaus and your little family. It’s cute."

“Uh, thanks? Glad you think we’re cute, but Klaus is just a friend.” He had to fight the urge to squirm in his seat. Why would she imply something like that?

“Uh huh. Just friends.” She said, looking down into her mug. “Just friends who joke about getting the kids to bed and have their names carved into a sleigh together and can’t go five minutes without trying to make each other laugh. Oh, and he definitely wasn’t the ‘friend’ you were talking about the other night. The one you’re terrified of never seeing again and whose feelings you’re so worried about hurting. Couldn’t be him.”

“I’m starting to think you don’t know what having friends is like.” Jesper told her. Very casually. Not defensively. Not at all defensive.

“Jesper, you’re basically raising kids together.” Alva said.

“We’re really not.” Jesper tried to ignore how much that stung to hear. “Until a few days ago I wasn’t even raising these kids.”

Alva raised an eyebrow. “Officially, maybe. But unofficially you’ve been feeding them and clothing them and looking out for them for quite a while now, and from what I’ve heard Klaus has had no small part in helping you do that.”

“Ok,” Jesper said, rubbing his temples. “How exactly do you know all this?”

“Kids talk.” Alva said, casually raising her mug to her face. “And certain kids like to talk about you and Klaus quite a lot.”

“So what? The kids like Klaus.”

“They do, and they seem to like both of you better when you’re together.”

“Yeah, it’s twice the attention.” Jesper said dismissively. “And about quadruple the food and toys, of course they do.”

“And then there’s the looks.” She added.

“What looks?”

“Y’know, the looks.” Alva insisted. “The helplessly infatuated looks you two can’t go five minutes without giving each other?”

Jesper opened and closed his mouth helplessly a few times then stood up abruptly, pacing the empty workshop furiously for a few seconds before finally speaking again.

“Listen,” He said firmly, still pacing. “I don’t know where you’re getting this idea from that there’s something more between me and Klaus. Yeah, so we spend a lot of time together. We basically work together! Of course we spend a lot of time together. And he helps me out with the kids a lot. He’s a nice guy! He likes kids! It doesn’t mean anything.”

Jesper gestured animatedly, not even looking at Alva as he spoke.

“And I mean, yes,” He continued. “I like spending time with him. It feels really nice to be around him and to hear him laugh and see him with the kids. And maybe I’ve been trying a little too hard to ignore the fact that just the thought of going even a single day without seeing him fills me with unspeakable dread but-”

Jesper stopped dead in his tracks.

“Oh.” He said. “I love him.”

And god, what awful timing that particular revelation had.

There was a single brief, loud laugh from Alva which seemed to catch even her off guard.

“Are you serious?” She wheezed, more uncontrollable laughter bubbling up. “You actually didn’t know? Oh my god, I thought you just didn’t want to tell me!”

“Hey, are you trying to wake everyone up?” Jesper frowned at her. “I’m over here having a major emotional revelation and you’re laughing at me! What kind of friend are you?”

Alva put both hands over her mouth, barely stifling the laughter that seemed to be shaking her whole body.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” She finally managed to say, still unable to look at Jesper without a wide and terribly amused smile across her face. “But how could you not know?”

“Well, I- I’ve been a little distracted.”

Alva cocked an eyebrow.

“Uh huh, go on.” She said, leaning back in her chair.

“I just- What do you mean ‘go on’? What do you mean ‘how could you not know’?” Jesper asked, throwing his hands up in the air. “What is falling in love with someone even supposed to look like? I didn’t think it looked like this. I’ve never felt like this before. How was I supposed to know what it was?”

The smile slipped off Alva’s face.

“Oh. Jesper, I-” She reached a hand out, but it faltered in midair between them. “I didn’t mean to- I’m not actually trying to make fun of you. I mean, ok, a little bit. But it’s ok if this is all new to you. Disastrous, stumbling young love isn’t for everyone. Honestly, sometimes I think I’d go back and skip it if I could! Have you never even had a crush on anyone?”

Jesper sat back down, looking at his hands tiredly.

“I thought I had. There were a few times my parents would set me up or I’d get close to someone while off at college and I thought there might be something there. But it never felt quite right, never felt anything like this does.”

Alva paused, looking at him meaningfully for a moment.

“Did you ever think maybe the reason none of them ever felt right was because you might not have much interest in women?” She asked, her tone was matter of fact but she had a cautious look in her eyes.

This time it was his turn to feel like he was stating the obvious.

“Alva, I already knew that.” He said. “I told my parents that when I was fifteen, right after my Mom decided finding me a suitor was her new favorite hobby and she started throwing a new girl at me every week.”

Alva looked surprised. “And how did that go?”

“Well then she started throwing boys at me, which was actually more stressful somehow.”

Alva snorted before trying to cover up her laughter with her hand again.

“I’m not laughing at you again, I promise.” She said, rather unconvincingly. “I’m laughing with you.”

“Wouldn’t I also need to be laughing for that to work?”

“Not out loud, your laughter can be implied.” Alva said, still smirking. “But seriously. Are you really telling me Klaus is your first love? Like, never even thought you were in love before? At all?”

“I always thought it was something I could take or leave.” He told her. “I’d try it out for a little bit, being with someone, but I didn’t get what the big deal was. It didn’t seem worth all the effort.”

Jesper paused, taking a shaky breath and feeling tears well up in his eyes.

“Klaus seems worth the effort though.”

“Ok, I’m trying to be the supportive friend here. I really am. But I was not prepared for there to be crying involved.” Alva said, shifting uncomfortably in her seat. “Do you, uh, do you need a minute?”

“This is just a lot right now, ok. I only just realized how I feel about him.” Jesper told her, roughly rubbing at his wet eyes. “And I don’t even know if he feels the same way about me.”

The man had literally just told him he was still mourning his dead wife. That didn’t exactly scream _‘looking to start a new relationship’_. Not that Alva needed to know that.

“I really don’t think you have to worry about Klaus not feeling the same way.” Alva said.

“How do you know that?”

“I have eyes?”

“ _Alva._ ” He whined. “I thought we’d already established I’m an idiot. Please spell it out for me. Use visual aids if you need to.”

“Jesper, he looks at you like you hung the stars in the sky.”

“That could mean anything.” He said dismissively, pulling his legs up and curling into himself in the chair.

“Ok, yeah. Maybe. But there’s one thing it tends to mean the most often.”

Jesper frowned. He was still trying to process “I love Klaus”, the possibility of “Klaus loves me” was just too much on top of that. It just wasn’t sinking in.

But the more he thought about it the more he wanted it to sink in, the more he wanted to believe it was true.

He drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair.

“Ok, what else?”

“Excuse me?” Alva asked, raising an eyebrow.

“What else have you noticed?”

“Jesper, I’ve only seen you two together for a few days.”

“Yeah,” He said. “And you already noticed all that. What else makes you think he loves me?”

Alva shook her head, smiling as she took a sip of her now cold drink.

“You’re a narcissistic idiot.” She said. “And I hope Klaus comes to his senses.”

“Come on Alva, I need details.” Jesper said impatiently.

“Ok, ok. Fine. Let me think.” She said, still smiling despite her annoyed tone.

They talked late into the night, Jesper picking apart every little thing Alva had to say until her actual observations had run dry and all she could respond to his never ending requests with were blatant and ridiculous lies. Which he did not seem to find nearly as funny as she did.

Eventually Alva fell asleep, leaning against the arm of her chair with a blanket over her lap and her head resting on her arms.

But Jesper wasn’t feeling nearly as peaceful.

He sat up well after the sun started peaking through the windows, mind still racing. Feeling a strange sense of relief despite all his uncertainty.

-

“What do you think you’re doing? I already painted that part.” Jesper said, watching Alva paint her own little additions onto one of his carousel horses the next morning.

“Well, maybe you’d have done a better job of it if you’d slept for more than twenty minutes.” Alva said quietly.

“Excuse you,” He retorted. “I’ve spent most of this year training to function on twenty minutes of sleep.”

Alva opened her mouth to throw the next punch in this round of banter but stopped short, looking up at the stairs.

“Oh wow.” She whispered in an indecipherable tone.

Jesper looked up at what had caught her attention, and his breath caught in his throat.

It wasn’t the clothes, though it was nice to see Klaus in something new and bright, it was the undeniable bashfulness that radiated off the man as the Saami women proudly presented the results of their handiwork.

Jesper felt a warmth in his chest that was so all encompassing, so overwhelming, that he almost couldn’t stand it. It wasn’t a new feeling. In fact, it was a feeling he’d associated with Klaus for quite a while now.

It was the same feeling, but it settled differently now that it had a name.

Jesper couldn’t help the sharp smile that took over his face as he watched Klaus fuss nervously at his new clothes.

“They insisted and I didn’t want to be rude.” Klaus said, self-consciously looking himself over. “It’s uh- What do you- It’s a lot of red. Is it too much?”

“No.” Jesper said wryly, feeling a warmth spread across his face as an undeniable fondness bloomed in his chest. “We’ll just blindfold the reindeer so they don’t get dizzy.”

There was a knock at the door. Jesper continued teasing and joking as he went to answer it, but wondered if maybe he had jumped up a little too quickly.

“I’m kidding! It looks great. You look good. You do.” He said, laughing as he opened the door.

But his laughter died immediately when he saw the familiar face waiting on the other side.

“Dad?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Haha, I thought this chapter was never going to be done! That's what I get for thinking I could fit so much of the movie into just one chapter.
> 
> Sooo many big feelings to get through! I think I had a little too much fun writing wing-man Alva! And wow, Jesper sure is good at almost getting shot.
> 
> And Sophie is absolutely going to pick up lots of Saami words and probably use them more than any other language! She'll be selectively mute all her life, but she'll probably end up learning more languages than any of the other kids. (Well, most of them anyways)
> 
> The last chapter definitely won't be done before Christmas, so I'll take the opportunity to wish you all a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays now.  
> Hope everyone has a good time and stays safe! Thank you for reading! :)


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